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JEWISH ANTIQUITIES 



COURSE OF LECTURES 



THE THREE FIRST BOOKS 



GODWIN'S MOSES AND AARON 



TO WHICH IS ANNEXED, 



&i$$ttUtion on tye l^etreto Slanguage, 



THE LATE REV. DAVID JENNINGS, D.D. 



A NEW EDITION. 



LOKDON : 

PRINTED FOR WILLIAM BAYNES AND SON, 
PATERNOSTER ROW ; 

AND H S. BAYNES, EDINBURGH. 

\ 

I 1825. 



THE 

PREFACE 

BY 

THE EDITOR. 



The learned and worthy Author originally composed 
the following Treatise for the private use of those 
theological pupils, who studied under his own direc- 
tion ; and it is now offered to the public, as deserving 
che perusal of all who would obtain an intimate ac- 
quaintance with the sacred oracles, especially with 
*be Old Testament; as well as of those whose pro- 
fession leads them more directly to the study of di- 
vinity. Many passages of the word of God are here 
skilfully explained and illustrated, and many more 
may be so, by a judicious application of that know- 
ledge of Jewish Antiquities, which is comprised in 
these Lectures. The representation made in them of 
the rites, customs, and opinions of the Jews, chiefly 
respects those which are found in Scripture ; for the 
clear understanding of which, besides carefully ex- 
amining and comparing the accounts given in the sa- 
cred code, and deriving as much light as possible 
from that fountain, the Author hath called in the as- 
sistance of Josephus and Philo, and, on some occa- 
sions, of the Jewish rabbies, as well as of a great 

a 2 



Vi PREFACE. 

variety of other writers, both ancient and modern, 
who have treated concerning the Jews and their 
affairs. Of the rabbinical writers he had indeed a 
very mean opinion, both in respect to the credit due 
to them, as relaters of ancient facts, or of established 
customs and opinions ; and in respect to their judg- 
ment, as interpreters of Scripture. Maimonides, Aben- 
Ezra, and Abarbanel, are the most eminent of this class, 
and almost the only persons amongst them who dis- 
cover a judicious and rational turn of mind. Of 
Maimonides in particular it is said, that he was the 
first Jew who ceased to trifle, "qui desiit desipere." 
But even these authors, though more respectable than 
most of their brethren, come too late to have much 
stress laid upon their report of the sentiments and 
practices of the ancient Jews, if not supported or 
countenanced by Scripture, or by some other writer 
of more antiquity and greater authority than them- 
selves. 

Though the learned Author chose to execute his 
design upon the plan of the three first books of God- 
win's Moses and Aaron, his work, nevertheless, doth 
not consist of detached remarks on the text of that 
writer, but of distinct and complete dissertations on 
the subjects treated of by him, and on some others 
which he hath omitted ; insomuch that it is not ne- 
cessary to have recourse continually to Godwin, in 
the perusal of the following volume ; which must have 
been the reader's disagreeable task, had this work 
been a collection of short notes and observations. In 
one or two places, the Editor hath taken the liberty 
of inserting, either from Godwin or from Hottingers 
Notes upon him, what seemed necessary to complete 



PREFACE. 



vii 



the subject, and render the discourse regular and uni- 
form ; particularly in the chapter on the gates of Jeru- 
salem, which, in the Author's MS copy, consisted 
merely of what the reader will here find on the mira- 
cle which our Saviour wrought at the pool of Bethesda ; 
situated, as some suppose, near the Sheep Gate. 
Nevertheless, though it is not requisite frequently 
to turn to Godwin in perusing this work, for a 
complete view of the subject, yet if the correspond- 
ent chapters in the two treatises are read in conjunc- 
tion, we shall see reason, on the comparison, to enter- 
tain the higher opinion of the industry with which our 
learned Author hath collected his materials, and of the 
judgment and skill with which he hath discussed the 
particular subject before him. 

The Editor hath taken care all along to insert the 
words of the text of Scripture which occur, and which 
in the manuscript were only quoted by the chapter 
and verse. The Author might reasonably expect from 
his pupils, that the passages referred to should be 
carefully consulted ; but it would have been irksome 
and tedious to the generality of readers, to be conti- 
nually turning to passages of Scripture in order to 
understand the meaning of the Author's observations 
upon them, or reasoning from them. And the neces- 
sity the Editor was under of introducing the texts 
obliged him to make some small alterations in the 
phraseology, especially in the connective particles and 
sentences, and even a few transpositions, in order to 
introduce them consistently with the regularity and 
uniformity of the whole. 



viii 



PREFACE. 



The references to authors, either for proof or 
illustration, which are very numerous, have for the 
most part been carefully examined, and made very 
particular, for the benefit of those who are disposed 
to consult the authorities on which the Author relies, 
or those writers who have treated more largely on the 
subject. For want of producing his authorities, Lewis's 
Jewish Antiquities, which are otherwise valuable, are 
very unsatisfactory to a man who is desirous, not only 
to know what hath been said, but by whom it hath 
been said, and what credit it deserves. 

With respect to the Dissertation on the Hebrew 
Language, it may be observed, that the Author once 
thought more highly of the antiquity and authority of 
the Masoretic readings, and of the vowel points, than 
he did after perusing the ingenious and learned Dr. 
Kennicott's two dissertations, especially his second on 
the Hebrew text; by which the Author, as well as the 
generality of the learned world, was convinced, they 
deserved not that extravagant and superstitious re- 
gard, which the credit of the two Buxtorfs, and of 
some other eminent Hebraicians in the last age, had 
procured them from men of letters. Once in par- 
ticular he expressed his sentiments on this subject to 
the Editor, and gave some general idea of his in- 
tended alteration in the Dissertation on the Jewish 
Language; which, it is presumed, he was prevented 
from accomplishing by the declining state of his 
health for some time before his decease. The ^Editor 
hath endeavoured to supply this little defect in some 
measure, by inserting a few references to, and obser- 



PREFACE. 



IX 



vations from, Dr. Kennicott, and by softening a few 
expressions, in conformity with the Author's latest sen- 
timents on this head. 

The reader will observe some digressions, in the 
earlier part of the work especially, to subjects which 
have an affinity to those of which the Author is treating. 
Some of these the Editor hath thrown into notes, and 
might perhaps have done it with a few more, particu- 
larly in the chapter on the patriarchal government. 
As most of these relate to illustrations of Scripture, the 
Author was willing- to indulge himself in them ; de- 
claring to his pupils, that he never thought himself out 
of his way while he was explaining the sacred oracles. 
However, these digressions are not numerous, and 
chiefly at the beginning of the work. 

Though this volume professedly treats of the subjects 
which are contained in the three first books of Godwin, 
yet several things are occasionally introduced relative 
to the subjects of his three last books ; which was one 
reason why the Author did not proceed to the particular 
consideration of them. Another was, that the three 
first books comprise all the subjects which relate to the 
sacred or ecclesiastical antiquities of the Hebrews, and 
which are peculiarly requisite to the understanding of 
the Jewish, and, consequently, in some measure, of the 
Christian scheme of theology. 

This piece of Godwin, styled Moses and Aaron, the 
method of which our Author chose to follow, hath been 
annotated and commented upon by a variety of authors. 
One of the most judicious, who have favoured the pub- 
lic with their lucubrations, is Hottinger. There are two 



X 



PREFACE. 



sets of annotations in manuscript, one by the learned 
Witsius, which he read to his students in the university 
of Leyden ; a copy of which was in the hands of Dr. 
Jennings, who hath been, in a few instances, and but 
in a few, beholden to it. Another annotator, whose 
performance is yet in manuscript, was the late Mr. 
Samuel Jones, of Tewkesbury. His work, of which 
there are several copies extant, is written in neat Latin, 
and contains very valuable remarks, which discover his 
great learning and accurate knowledge of his subject. 
From this writer the Editor hath inserted a note at page 
380, and in a few other places. Dr. Jennings never 
saw Mr. Jones's Annotations, though there is a simila- 
rity in a few of their observations, they having both 
been in possession of a copy of Witsius. But the Doc- 
tor's own work surpasses the performances of both these 
learned writers, as in some other respects, so particu- 
larly in compass and variety, and as it contains the 
opinions and improvements of later authors : and it is 
hoped will answer the end for which it was originally 
composed, and is now published, — the advancement of 
religion and learning, and the knowledge of those 
oracles of God, which are able to make us wise to 
salvation. 

PHILIP FURNEAUX. 



CONTENTS. 



BOOK I. 
CONCERNING PERSONS. 



CHAP. I. 

Page 

Of the Form of the Hebrew Commonwealth 1 

CHAP. II. 

Of the Publicans and Taxes .* 55 

CHAP. III. 

Israelites and Proselytes -. 67 

CHAP. IV. 

Of their Kings Ill 

CHAP. V. 

Of the High-Priests, Priests, Levites, and Nethinim 129 

CHAP. VI. 

Of the Prophets 234 

CHAP. VII. 

Of the title Rabbi 279 



xii 



CONTENTS. 



CHAP. VIII. 

PclgC 

Of the Nazarkes and Rechabites 285 

CHAP. IX. 

Of the Assideans and Karraites 296 

CHAP. X. 

Of the Pharisees 301 

CHAP. XI. 

Of the Sadducees and Samaritans 314 

CHAP. XII. 

OftheEssenes 320 

CHAP. XIII. 

Of the Gaulonites and Herodians 327 



BOOK II. 
CONCERNING PLACES. 
CHAP. I. 

Of the Tabernacle and Temple ! 333 

CHAP. II. 

Of the Synagogues, Schools, and Houses of Prayer 363 

CHAP. III. 

Of the Gates of Jerusalem, and of the Temple 384 



CONTENTS. xm 

CHAP. IV 

Page 

Of the Groves and High Places , 391 

CHAP. V. 

Of the Cities of Refuge 397 



BOOK III. 

CONCERNING TIMES. 
CHAP. I. 

Of Days, Hours, Weeks, and Years 401 

CHAP. II. 

Of their Feasts 418 

CHAP. III. 

Of the Sabbath 428 

CHAP. IV. 

Of the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread 448 

CHAP. V, 

Of the Feast of Pentecost 483 

CHAP. VI. 

Of the Feast of Tabernacles 490 

CHAP. VII. 

Of the Feast of Trumpets, and New Moons 501 



XIV CONTENTS. 



CHAP. VIII. 

Page 

Of the Day of Expiation 510 

CHAP. IX. 

Of the Sabbatical Year, or Seventh Years Rest 527 

CHAP. X. 

The Jubilee 537 

CHAP. XL 

The Feasts of Purim and of Dedication 544 



APPENDIX. 

Concerning the Language of the Jews 551 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES 



BOOK I. 

CONCERNING PERSONS. 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



CHAPTER I. 

OF THE FORM OF THE HEBREW COMMONWEALTH. 

The ancient state and form of the Hebrew government may- 
be distinguished into patriarchal and special. The patriarchal 
universally prevailed in the first ages. By special we mean 
the government peculiar to the people of Israel, from the time 
of their entrance into Egypt to the end of their polity. 

Of the Patriarchal Form of Government. 

L The patriarchal form (so called from irarpia, familia, and 
ap\<j)v , princeps) is denned by Godwin to consist, in " the fa- 
thers of families, and their first-born after them, exercising all 
kinds of ecclesiastical and civil authority in their respective 
households; blessing, cursing, casting out of doors, disinherit- 
ing, and punishing with death." 

It is natural to suppose, that Adam, the father of all man- 
kind, would be considered as supreme amongst them, and 
have special honour paid him, as long as he lived; and that 
when his posterity separated into distinct families and tribes, 
their respective fathers would be acknowledged by them as 
their princes. For as they could not, in any tolerable manner, 
live together without some kind of government, and no go- 
vernment can subsist without some head in whom the execu- 
tive power is lodged, whom were the children so likely, after 
they grew up, to acknowledge in this capacity, as their father, 
to whose authority they had been used to submit in their early 
years? And hence those, who were at first only acknowledged 
as kings over their own households, grew insensibly into mo- 

B 



2 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK I. 



narchs of larger communities, by claiming the same authority 
over the families which branched out from them, as they had 
exercised over their own. However, the proper patriarchal 
government is supposed to have continued among the people 
of God until the time of the Israelites dwelling in Egypt; for 
then we have the first intimation of a different form of govern- 
ment among them. 

Our author hath perhaps assigned greater authority to the 
patriarchs than they reasonably could or did claim and exer- 
cise; at least, the instances he produces to prove they were 
ordinarily invested with such a despotic power, " in dvilibus 
et sacris," as he ascribes to them, are not sufficiently con- 
vincing. 

That there was some civil government in the first ages, is 
supposed to appear from the history of Cain, who was not only 
banished, but was apprehensive he should be punished with 
death, for the murder of his brother Abel. "And Cain said 
unto the Lord, My punishment is greater than I can bear. 
Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the 
earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugi- 
tive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, 
that everyone that findeth me shall slay me;" Gen. iv. 13, 14. 
Where nft"JN adhamah, which we render, the earth, may sig- 
nify his native country, viz. that part of the world where 
Adam dwelt, where himself was born, and where his nearest 
kindred and acquaintance lived : this word, as well as v IN 
arets, being frequently applied to a particular country, as to 
the land of Canaan, Gen. xxviii. 11; to the land of Egypt, 
Exod. viii. 17; and to several others. # 

By " the face of God from which he was hid," or banished, 
is properly meant what the Jews called the Shechinah, a shin- 
ing light or glory, in which God was wont to manifest his pre- 
sence, and to present himself as a visible object of worship, 
and from which he gave oracles, as he did afterward in the 
Jewish tabernacle over the mercy-seat; though St.Chrysostom 
understands his being " hid from the face of God," of the Di- 
vine Being's withdrawing his gracious presence from him, and 
putting him from under his protection. 



* Vid. Stockii Clav. in verb. 



CHAP. I.] 



PATRIARCHAL GOVERNMENT. 



3 



Many have thought, that upon his being thus banished from 
the divine presence, he turned idolater, and set up the worship 
of the sun, as the best resemblance of the Shechinah, or visible 
divine glory; and thus they account for the early introduction 
of that most general and most ancient kind of idolatry. 

The reason why this lighter punishment of banishment was 
inflicted on him, instead of that severer one of death, which 
his crime had merited, is supposed to be either, first, that he 
might continue a living example of divine vengeance, in order 
to deter others from the like crime, whereas had he been put 
to death, the criminal and his punishment might soon have 
been forgotten : or, secondly, as Grotius conceives, because 
there being yet but few inhabitants in the world, it was fit he 
should be suffered to live for the propagation of the species ; 
or at least an example of severity was less requisite, as there 
were not many who were likely to be exposed to such out- 
rages.* 

However, it appears that Cain, being sensible of his de- 
serts, was afraid the punishment of death would be inflicted 
on him : for he adds, " I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond 
on the earth ; and it shall come to pass, that every one that 
findeth me shall slay me that is, either as a common enemy, 
or at least as one banished and outlawed, and not under the 
protection of the government. 

It follows, Gen. iv. 15, "And the Lord said unto him, There- 
fore whoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him 
seven-fold:" that is, as some understand it, to the seventh 
generation; or it may rather be a definite number for an in- 
definite ;f and so the meaning is, he shall endure many pu- 
nishments, or shall be severely punished. 

" And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him 
should slay him." Many are the conjectures, both of Jews and 
Christians (some of them ridiculous enough), concerning this 
mark. Some will have it, God stigmatized him with a brand 
in his forehead, to denote his being accursed; others, that he 
had a wild aspect, and bloody eyes, which rolled in a horrid 
manner. The fathers, in general, suppose, that he had a con- 

* De jure belli et pacis, lib. i. cap. 2, sect. 5. 

f Instances of this you have in Psalm xii. 6; cxix. 164; and Prov. xxiv. 
16, and many other places. 

b2 



4 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



tinual trembling of the body, so that he could hardly get his 
food to his mouth. This opinion is favoured by the Septuagint, 
which renders " a fugitive and a vagabond," <ttevwv kul rptfiov, 
lamenting and trembling. Others tell us, that wherever he 
went the earth shook under him. And another notion (as well 
founded as any of the former) is, that he had a horn growing 
out of his forehead, to warn people to avoid him. Le Clerc 
imagines, that God ordered him to wear some distinguishing 
garment, perhaps of some glaring colour, as a mark or sign 
upon him for his preservation ; like the blood upon the door- 
posts of the Israelites' houses, Exod. xii. 13 ; or the scarlet line 
in Rahab's window, Josh. ii. 18 ; for had he been clothed only 
with the skins of wild beasts, as in those days men generally 
were, after the fashion of their first parents, Gen. ui. 21, he 
would have been very liable, whenever he had wandered in the 
woods and thickets, to have been shot at by some hunter, and 
perhaps killed through mistake. A similar instance you have 
in the fable of Cephalus and Procis. 

However, Dr. Shuckford's opinion is the most probable, 
who renders the words TDK y*pb mrh DiZW vejasem Jehovah 
lecain oth, " God gave to Cain a sign," or token, probably by 
some apparent miracle, that he would providentially protect 
him; so that none that met him should kill him.* In this 
sense the word JTIK oth is used when the rainbow is called 
the niK oth, that is, the sign or token of the covenant which 
God made with Noah ; whereby he assured him, that he would 
drown the world no more ; Gen. ix. 12 — 17 : and when Gideon 
desired, that the angel would show him a sign, or some mi- 
raculous token, that he brought him a commission from God, 
and that he should be able to destroy the Midianites ; Judges 
vi. 17: see also Psalm lxxxvi. 17. 

Another article in the history of the antediluvian ages, 
which is supposed to intimate that there was a civil govern- 
ment then subsisting, is the story of Lamech. " Lamech 
said unto his wives, Adah and Zillah, Hear my voice ; ye wives 
of Lamech, hearken unto my speech : for I have slain a man 
unto my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. If Cain 
shall be avenged seven-fold, truly Lamech seventy and seven- 



* Shuckford's Connect, vol. i. p. 8. 



CHAP. I.] 



PATRIARCHAL GOVERNMENT. 



5 



fold Gen. iv. 23, 24. This speech, which is introduced 
without any connexion with the preceding history, has given 
interpreters not a little trouble. The Jewish Rabbies attempt 
to explain it by the help of a story, perhaps of their own in- 
vention ; that Lamech, as he was hunting, being informed by a 
certain youth, that a wild beast lay lurking in a secret place, 
went thither, and unawares killed Cain, who lay hid there, 
with a dart ; and then, upon finding his mistake, in a fit of 
rage for what he had done, beat the youth to death ; so that 
Cain was the man he had slain by wounding him ; and the 
youth, the young man he had killed by hurting, or beating 
him. But as this story is without any foundation in Scripture, 
we have no reason to look upon it in any other light than as a 
mere fable ; though St. Jerome says it was received as true 
by several Christians. Jacobus Capellus, in his Historia 
Sacra et Exotica, fancies that Lamech, being in a vapoury 
humour, was boasting of his courage, and what he would do 
if there was occasion : " I would, or will, kill a man, if he 
wound#me; and a young man if he hurts me." But this 
version offers too much violence to the Hebrew text : Onke- 
los, who wrote the first Chaldee paraphrase on the Pentateuch, 
has given us an easier sense, reading the following words with 
an interrogation : " Have I slain a man to my wounding, and 
a young man to my hurt V and accordingly he paraphrases it 
thus : " I have not killed a man, that I should bear the sin of 
it; nor have I destroyed a young man, that my offspring 
should be cut off for it." Dr. Shuckford has improved this 
interpretation, by supposing that Lamech was endeavouring to 
reason his wives and family out of their fear of having the 
death of Abel revenged upon them, who were of the posterity 
of Cain. As if he had said, " What have we done, that we 
should be afraid ? We have not killed a man, nor offered any 
injury to our brethren of any other family ; and if God would 
not allow Cain to be killed, who had murdered his brother, 
but threatened to take seven-fold vengeance on any that should 
kill him ; doubtless they must expect much greater punish- 
ment, who should presume to kill any of us. Therefore, we 
may surely look upon ourselves as safe under the protection 
of the law, and of the providence of God." 



6 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK 1. 

Having thus considered those parts of sacred history which 
are produced as evidences of a civil government in the early 
ages of the world ; we now proceed to examine the particular 
instances alleged of that despotic power of the patriarchs, 
which our author ascribes to them. 

The first is of Noah, who pronounced a curse upon Ca- 
naan — " Cursed be Canaan ; a servant of servants shall he be 
unto his brethren Gen. ix. 25. 

It may reasonably be believed, that Noah, being the second 
father of mankind, had, for a considerable time, the honour 
and authority of universal monarch, as Adam had before him. 
Some insist upon it, that Nimrod was the first that drew 7 off a 
party from their allegiance to Noah ; and, setting up for a 
king, proved an oppressive tyrant. Accordingly, his being 
called piO nnj gibbor baarets, which the Septuagint renders 
yiyag tin ty\q yr\g, Gen. x. 8, may refer, not to his stature, but 
to his power ; for Hesychius makes yiyag to signify the 
same as ^vvaarr]g, ivyypog, potens, robustus. Nimrod is ex- 
pressly said to have set up " a kingdom," ver. 1#; and, 
just before, ver. 9, " to have been a mighty hunter before 
the Lord." Which the Jerusalem Paraphrast interprets of a 
sinful hunting after the sons of men, to turn them off from 
the true religion. But it may as well be taken in a more 
literal sense, for hunting of wild beasts; inasmuch as the 
circumstance of his being a mighty hunter, is mentioned 
with great propriety, to introduce the account of his set- 
ting up his kingdom ; the exercise of hunting being looked 
upon in ancient times as a means of acquiring the rudiments 
of war :* for which reason, the principal heroes of hea- 
then antiquity, as Theseus, Nestor, &c, were, as Xenophon 
tells us, bred up to hunting. Besides, it may be supposed, 
that by this practice Nimrod drew together a great com- 
pany of robust young men to attend him in his sport ; and 
by that means increased his power. And by destroying the 
wild beasts, which, in the comparatively defenceless state of 

* Vid. Xenophon. Cyrop. lib. i. p. 10, edit. Hutch.; Philon. lud. de Jo- 
seph, ab initio, apud opera, p. 411, edit. Colon. Allobrog. et eundem de 
vita Mosis, p. 475. See these and other authors cited by Bochart in his 
Geographia Sacra, lib. iv. cap. 12. 



CHAP. 1.] 



PATRIARCHAL GOVERNMENT. 



7 



society in those early ages, were no doubt very dangerous 
enemies, he might, perhaps, render himself farther popular ; 
thereby engaging numbers to join with him, and to promote 
his chief design of subduing men, and making himself master 
of nations. 

But to return to Noah, and to the instance which our 
author assigns of his patriarchal authority, in denouncing 
a curse upon Canaan. 

Unless it could be proved, that all the patriarchs were en- 
dowed with a prophetic spirit, as it was evident Noah was, 
when he foretold the fate of his three sons and their posterity, 
it will by no means follow from the instance before us, that 
the authority of the patriarchs generally reached so far as to 
pronounce effectual blessings and curses on their children and 
subjects. In short, in this affair, Noah seems to have acted 
rather as a prophet than as a patriarch : no argument there- 
fore can be drawn from his conduct on this occasion, to prove 
the extent of the patriarchal power. 

Some difficulties occur in this piece of sacred history, which 
we cannot pass over without attempting at least to explain 
them. 

1st. It is inquired in what Ham's crime consisted. ' 

The history informs us, that he " saw the nakedness of his 
father, and told his two brethren without ;" Gen. ix. 22. Now 
merely seeing might be accidental, unavoidable, and no way 
criminal. We must, therefore, suppose, there was something 
more in the case than is plainly expressed. 

Some Jewish doctors make his crime to be castrating his 
father Noah, to prevent his having any more sons, lest his 
share in the division of the world should not be as large as he 
wished ; which conceit some very grave authors have seriously 
refuted, from these words : " Noah awoke from his wine, and 
knew what his younger son had done unto him ver. 24. 
They argue, that if Ham had performed so painful an opera- 
tion upon his father, the anguish would undoubtedly have 
awoke him, and the criminal had been taken in the very fact. 

Mr. Vander Hart, professor of the oriental languages in the 
university of Helmstad, is of opinion, that Ham's crime was 
committing incest with his father's wife. But if we may sup— 
pose the narrations of Moses to be thus disguised, there will 



8 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



be hardly any depending upon a single fact he relates. The 
most probable, therefore, as well as the easiest account, is this, 
that Ham told his brethren of what he had seen, in a scornful 
manner. It is said, " he told his brethren without;'' per- 
haps in the street, publicly before the people, proclaiming his 
father's shame with contempt and derision ; the very sin to 
which such exemplary vengeance was afterward threatened : 
" The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey 
his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the 
young eagles shall eat it;" Prov. xxx. 17. 

2dly. It is inquired, why Noah denounced the curse, not on 
Ham himself, but on his son Canaan; Gen. ix. 25. 

It might very likely be a reason, why Canaan is here so 
particularly mentioned by Moses, that hereby the Israelites 
might be encouraged to war against the Canaanites, who were 
the posterity of this Canaan ; when they knew, that by a curse 
they were devoted to subjection and slavery; and that on 
this account, they might be assured of victory over them. 

But as to the reason of the curse being denounced on 
Canaan : 

1st. Some by Canaan understand Canaan's father; which 
is a very harsh interpretation. 

2dly. The opinion of the Hebrew doctors is, that Canaan 
first saw Noah in an indecent posture, and made a jest of it 
to his father Ham. For proof of this, they allege the words 
already quoted, " Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what 
his younger son had done unto him ;" ver. 24. By |tOpn 133 
beno hakatan, which we render Noah's younger son (Jilius 
parvus), they understand his grandson. But this, also, is too 
forced an interpretation. For as bYU gadhol, magnus, is else- 
where applied to Japhet, to signify his being the elder, Gen. 
x. 21, so pp katan, parvus, is most naturally, in this place, 
to be understood of the younger son. 

3dly. The easiest solution of this difficulty, I conceive, is 
this, that what is commonly called a curse, in this place, is 
rather a prophecy ; so that the words, " cursed be Canaan," 
Gen. ix. 25, would better be rendered, " cursed shall Canaan 
be," that is, the posterity of Canaan, who from him were called 
Canaanites ; for the blessings which Noah emphatically pro- 
nounced upon his two other sons, related to their posterity ; 



CHAP. I.J PATRIARCHAL GOVERNMENT. 



9 



as is evident from the following words : " God shall enlarge 
Japhet, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem;" ver. 27. 
Now though the Canaanites suffered for their own sins (Lev. 
xviii. 24, 25, and Gen. xv. 16), yet it was a present punish- 
ment inflicted upon Ham, to be informed by the spirit of 
prophecy, that one branch of his posterity would prove so 
exceeding vile as to fall remarkably under the curse of God, 
and be made a slave to the posterity of his brethren. Which 
leads us to inquire, 

3dly. What is meant by his being a " servant of servants 
" Cursed be Canaan ; a servant of servants shall he be unto 
his brethren." 

This may easily be determined from the use of the like 
phrase on other occasions. Sanctum sanctorum signified the 
most holy place in the Jewish tabernacle and temple ; and 
canticum canticorum, the most excellent song. In like man- 
ner, servus servorum, a servant of servants, is the basest and 
vilest of servants, that is, a slave ; and very remarkably was 
the prediction fulfilled eight hundred years after, when the 
Israelites, who were descended from Shem, took possession 
of the land of Canaan, subduing thirty kings, killing a vast 
number of the inhabitants, laying heavy tributes on the re- 
mainder, or driving them out of their country, and using the 
Gibeonites, who saved themselves by a wile, though not pro- 
perly as slaves, yet as mere drudges for the service of the 
tabernacle ; and when, afterwards, the scattered relics of the 
Canaanites, at Tyre, at Thebes, and at Carthage, were all 
conquered and cut off by the Greeks and Romans, who were 
descended from Japhet.* 

The second instance which Godwin produces of the de- 
spotic power of the patriarchs, is Abraham's turning Hagar 
and Ishmael out of his family; Gen. xxi. 9, &c. 

When Abraham left his father's house, and came into the 
land of Canaan, being there sui juris, and subject to none, 
he doubtless exercised a patriarchal jurisdiction in his own 
family; in which he was succeeded by Isaac and Jacob. But 
as for his turning his concubine and her sons out of doors, 

* See Philippi Olearii disputat. historico-moral. de Cham, maledict. 
Lips. 1707; and Apud Thesau. nov. theologico-philolog. torn. i. p. 168, 
Lugd. Bat et Amstel. 1732. 



10 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



when he had a child by his lawful wife, it is too common a 
case to be an evidence of any singular authority vested in 
the patriarchs, and peculiar to those ages. 

The third instance is that of Jacob's denouncing a curse 
upon Simeon and Levi, — " Cursed be their anger, for it was 
fierce ; and their wrath, for it was cruel : I will divide them 
in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel;" Gen. xlix. 7. 

But this might have been more properly alleged as an in- 
stance of prophetic inspiration than of patriarchal authority ; 
it being among the predictions which, under a divine afflatus, 
Jacob delivered concerning the posterity of his twelve sons. 
And very remarkably was this prediction fulfilled. The tribe 
of Simeon, upon the division of the land of Canaan, had not 
a separate inheritance assigned them by themselves, but only 
a portion in the midst of the tribe of Judah ; Josh. xix. 1. 9. 
And when they were afterward increased, they acquired pos- 
sessions where they could, far from the rest of their brethren ; 
1 Chron. iv. 39. 42. And if the Jewish tradition be credible, 
that many of them, wanting a livelihood, engaged in teaching 
children, and were employed as schoolmasters in all the other 
tribes of Israel, it was a further accomplishment of Jacob's 
prophecy. As for the tribe of Levi, it was remarkably scat- 
tered among the other tribes ; having no tract of land as- 
signed it, in the manner they had, but only certain cities (with 
a little land about them), out of all the other tribes. See Josh . 
xxi. passim. Howbeit, as this tribe manifested an extraor- 
dinary zeal against idolatry in the affair of the golden calf, 
Exod. xxxii. 26 — 28, the curse was taken off, or rather 
turned into a blessing, ver. 29 ; for it was consecrated of God 
to " teach Jacob his judgments, and Israel his laws," Deut. 
xxxiii. 9, 10 ; and the Levites had the tenth of all the in- 
crease of the land assigned them, throughout all the country. 

The fourth instance of patriarchal authority, which is al- 
leged, is of Judah ; who, when he was informed that Tamar, 
his daughter-in-law, had played the harlot, and was with child 
by whoredom, said, " Bring her forth, and let her be burnt;" 
Gen. xxxviii. 24. From whence it is inferred, that Judah, 
as a patriarch, was invested with supreme authority in his 
own house, and even with power of life and death. But to 
this it is objected, 



CHAP. I.] 



HEBREW GOVERNMENT. 



11 



1st. It is not probable that Judah should be invested with 
such authority, while his father Jacob was still living : much 
less, 

2dly. That he should have such a despotic power over 
Tamar, w T ho was not one of his family ; for, after the death of 
Onan, she had returned to dwell in her own father's house ; 
ver. 11. Nor, 

3dly. If he had possessed such a pow r er, is it likely he 
would have been guilty of so much injustice and cruelty, as to 
put her to death, when she was with child ? Perhaps there- 
fore Judah might speak only as a prosecutor : " Bring her 
forth, to her trial, in order that she may be burnt after her 
delivery. " For though the law of Moses, which enacted that 
adultery should be punished with death, Lev. xx. 10, was not 
yet given, burning seems, however, to have been the punish- 
ment of that crime, which custom had established. We find 
it practised by the Philistines, who were not under the law of 
Moses. When Samson's wife had married another man, 
" they burnt her with fire Judges xv. 6. It is farther to be 
considered, that though Tamar had lived a widow since the 
death of Onan, yet she was legally espoused to his younger 
brother Shelah, and only waited till he was of proper age for 
the consummation of the marriage, and therefore she was con- 
sidered as a wife, and consequently as an adulteress. 

Of the Special Form of the Hebrew Government. 

Having thus examined the hints of the patriarchal form of 
government, which are to be found in the only authentic his- 
tory of those early ages, we proceed, 

II. To consider the special government of the people of 
Israel, from the beginning of their national polity to its final 
dissolution. Here I shall distinguish this large tract of time 
into four periods : 

1st. From their entrance into Egypt to their entrance into 
Canaan. 

2dly. From their entrance into Canaan to the captivity. 
3dly. During the captivity ; and, 

4thly. From the captivity to the destruction of Jerusalem. 
I. The first period is, from their entrance into Egypt to 



12 



JEWISH A N T I Q U I T I E S . 



[BOOK I. 



their entrance into Canaan, which may conveniently be sub- 
divided into two lesser periods. 

The former takes up the time of their sojourning in the land 
of Egypt ; the latter, the time of their migration through the 
wilderness, from Egypt to Canaan. 

First. As to the state and form of their government while 
they sojourned in Egypt. 

No doubt, while Jacob and Joseph lived, they were their 
own masters, and were governed by their own laws. And 
though afterwards, " when another king arose that knew not 
Joseph," they were enslaved by the Egyptians, yet we may 
perhaps discern the shadow, at least, of some form of civil 
government still subsisting among them. 

God commanded Moses to "gather the D>3pr zikenim, elders 
of Israel, together, in order to deliver to them the message with 
which he was sent to their nation;" Exod. iii. 16. And 
" Moses and Aaron went, and gathered together all the elders 
of the children of Israel;" chap. iv. 29. 

By elders some understand the judges in their civil courts; 
because we find this title afterwards applied to such judges, 
Deut. xxi. 2, xix. 12, and in several other places. But it is 
an objection of no small weight against this opinion, that when 
Moses had brought the Israelites out of Egypt, there were no 
such judges among them; but Moses judged all himself, to his 
exceeding great trouble ; Exod. xviii. 13, &c. By the elders, 
therefore, spoken of before, during their abode in Egypt, may 
only be meant the wisest and gravest men in the highest 
esteem among them, or at most, according to Mr. Selden, 
the heads of their tribes.* 

As for the DVUD1# shoterim, officers of the children of Israel, 
Exod. v. 14, which they had amongst them at this time, they 
seem to have been appointed, and set over them, by the 
Egyptians, merely for the purpose of overseeing the work 
they were employed in. 

So that, upon the whole, we have only very dark and un- 
certain hints of any special form of government among the 
Hebrews during their abode in Egypt. But, 

Secondly. The form of their government is far more con- 

* Uxor. Hebr. lib. i. cap. 15. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE THEOCRACY. 



13 



spicuous in and during their migration through the wilder- 
ness from Egypt to Canaan. 

Presently after they had left Egypt, the Theocracy was set 
up among them, that is, God condescended to be their king, 
as well as their God. The word OtoKparia, formed by Josephus 
from Gfoc, Deus, and Kpareuj, impero, very happily expresseth 
that peculiar government which God exercised over the peo- 
ple of Israel. To them he stood in a threefold relation. 

First. As their Creator, in common with the rest of man- 
kind ; and, therefore, as the Lord of their consciences, he 
required from them all the duties of the moral law. 

Secondly. He was their God, as they were a visible church, 
separated from all the nations of the earth to be his peculiar 
people. In this character he prescribed the peculiar forms 
and distinguishing rites and ceremonies of their religious 
worship. 

Thirdly. He was their proper king, the sovereign of their 
body politic, in which character he gave them judicial or 
political laws relating to government and civil life ; he ordered 
a royal palace to be built for his residence among them, I 
mean the tabernacle, in which he dwelt, or manifested his 
special presence, by the Shechinah, as the Jews call it ; that 
is, by a bright cloud, or glory, appearing over the mercy-seat, 
betwixt the two cherubim in the innermost room of that palace, 
Lev. xvi. 2; on which account he is said to " dwell betwixt 
the cherubim," Psalm lxxx. 1 ; and to " sit betwixt the che- 
rubim," Psalm xcix. 1. From thence he gave forth oracles, 
or signified his will concerning matters of importance to the 
state, which were not determined by the body of written laws; 
Lev. i. 1. 

It should seem, the common way of giving these oracles 
was by an audible voice. In this manner, we are expressly 
informed, the oracle was given to Moses, when he went into 
the tabernacle to consult it; Numb. vii. 89. And it may be 
inferred from the phrase by w T hich the oracle is usually ex- 
pressed, "Jehovah spoke, saying," or "Jehovah said." 

However that w 7 as (which w T ill be considered more fully in 
its proper place), it sufficiently appears, that by the oracle, or 
by Jehovah himself, all laws were enacted, war was pro- 
claimed, and magistrates were appointed ; in which three 



14 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



things the summa potestas, or sovereign authority, of any 
state, consisteth. # 

1st. Laws were enacted and promulgated immediately by 
the oracle, or voice of Jehovah. 

Thus, when the laws of the two tables were given at mount 
Sinai, the voice of Jehovah was heard by all the people ; 
Deut. v. 22, 23. But the majesty in which God manifested 
himself on that occasion was so very awful, that it struck them 
with amazement, and a kind of horror ; therefore the rest of 
the laws were, at their request, communicated more privately 
to Moses, and by him to the people. Yet they were all given 
immediately, by the oracle, or voice of Jehovah. " The Lord 
spake unto Moses, saying/' is the usual preface to every body 
or parcel of laws. 

Now these laws are an evidence that Jehovah acted as their 
king, as well as their God, since they contain a number of 
forensic, as well as moral and ceremonial precepts, relating to 
their civil polity and government, to their magistrates and 
judges, their estates and inheritances, their trade and com- 
merce, and even to the form of their houses, their food, and 
their apparel. God enacted all their laws, and no power was 
vested in any one else, either to make new, or repeal old 
ones. 

2dly. God, as king, reserved to himself the sovereign right 
of proclaiming war and making peace with their neighbouring 
nations. 

He proclaimed war with the Amalekites, Exod. xvii. 16, 
and with the Midianites, Numb. xxxi. 1, 2; and therefore a 
certain history of the wars of the Israelites, now lost, is called 
" the book of the wars of the Lord Numb. xxi. 14. Jeho- 
vah commanded, and even headed, their armies in their 
marches and in their battles. Thus the tabernacle, or royal 
tent, led their marches through the wilderness; from thence, 
by the rising and falling of a miraculous cloud over it, was the 
signal given when they should proceed, and when they should 
rest; Numb. ix. 17, 18. By this extraordinary appearance, or 
token of the divine presence, was the course, as well as the 
time, of their marches directed ; for " the Lord went before 



* Vid. Conring. de Rep. Heb. sect. vii. et seq. 



CHAP. I.] THE THEOCRACY. 15 

them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way ; and 
by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and 
night;" Exod. xiii. 21. To these miraculous signals those 
words of Moses refer, " When the ark set forward, Moses 
said, Rise up, Lord, and let thine enemies be scattered, and 
let them that hate thee, flee before thee. And when it rested, 
he said, Return, O Lord, unto the many thousands of Israel ;" 
Numb. x. 35, 36. 

We may remark by the way, with Taubman in his notes on 
Virgil, that it proceeded, probably, from a tradition of this 
usual appearance of the God of Israel, that the heathen poets 
frequently represent their deities as appearing in a cloud, with 
a peculiar brightness in it. 

Now, God himself undertaking to lead their marches, it 
was great presumption in them ever to march without his sig- 
nal or order; and when, therefore, they would thus have 
marched into Canaan, Moses sharply expostulates with them, 
" Wherefore now do you transgress the commandment of the 
Lord ? But it shall not prosper. Go not up, for the Lord is 
not among you, that ye be not smitten before your enemies ;" 
Numb. xiv. 41, 42. Which words suggest a sufficient reason 
of their being sometimes defeated, though Jehovah himself 
was their king and general. 

The whole direction of the siege of Jericho, and the manner 
of taking it, Josh, vi., are a further illustrious instance of Je- 
hovah's immediate conduct of their military affairs. 

3dly. God in his royal capacity appointed all officers in the 
state. Thus he made Moses his viceroy or prime-minister ; 
and Joshua not only the successor of Moses after his death, 
but an associate with him, or his deputy and lieutenant, during 
his life : for so Dr. Patrick understands that order which 
God gave to Moses concerning Joshua, " Thou shalt put 
some of thine honour upon him, that all the congregation of 
the children of Israel may be obedient;" Numb, xxvii. 20. 
Onkelos, indeed, and the Hebrew doctors, understand by the 
word Tin hod, which we render " honour" in that place (but 
which more commonly signifies glory), the splendour which 
shone in the face of Moses, after he came down from the 
mount, part of which, they supposed, was now imparted to 
Joshua, in order to make him appear more venerable in the 



16 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



eyes of the people. Upon which, they say, Moses's face 
shone like the sun, Joshua's like the moon. But they should 
have observed, that Moses is ordered to put some of his glory 
or honour upon Joshua ; which cannot be understood, with 
any propriety, of that miraculous lustre which Moses had no 
power to impart, but may very naturally be interpreted of the 
honour resulting from his authority and post in the govern- 
ment, in which Joshua was now to be joined with him. 

We further observe, to this purpose, that when Jethro sug- 
gested to Moses, that, for his ease in the government, he 
should appoint a number of inferior officers under him, he 
(being doubtless informed by Moses of the extraordinary con- 
stitution of the Hebrew state) did not propose he should do it 
without a special order from Jehovah, but that he should con- 
sult the oracle : n If thou shalt do this thing, and God com- 
mand thee so, then thou shalt be able to endure," &c. ; Exod. 
xviii. 23. And thus, likewise, when any doubt arose about 
the meaning of any law which God had already given ; or 
when any case occurred which the law had not expressly pro- 
vided for, Jehovah himself must be consulted about it. As 
in the case of those who were defiled by a dead body, and 
therefore could not keep the passover on the day appointed, 
Numb. ix. 6 — 10 ; in the case of the sabbath-breaker, 
Numb. xv. 34, 35 ; and of Zelophehad's daughters, about the 
right of inheritance; Numb, xxvii. 5 — 7. From which in- 
stances it plainly appears, that God stood in the peculiar rela- 
tion to the Israelites, of their king as well as their God. 
When, therefore, they afterwards desired a king " to judge 
them, like the other nations," God says, they had " rejected 
him, that he should not reign over them ;" 1 Sam. viii. 7. And 
Samuel upbraids them with this their rebellion : " Ye said, 
a king shall reign over us, when the Lord your God was 
your king," 1 Sam. xii. 12; that is, in the same sense in. ; 
which the kings of other nations are their kings ; otherwise, 
the desiring an earthly king would not have been inconsistent 
with the sovereignty of Jehovah, and their allegiance to him. 

Since, then, Jehovah himself was the king, as well as the 
God, of Israel, it follows, that the priests and Levites, who 
were the more immediate and stated attendants on his pre- 
sence, in the royal tent or palace, as the tabernacle or temple 



CHAP. I.] 



THE THEOCRACY. 



17 



may be styled, and to whom the execution of the law was in 
many cases committed, were properly ministers of state and 
of civil government, as well as of religion. Thus, to them it 
belonged to declare who were clean and who were unclean ; 
who should be shut out of the congregation, and who should 
be admitted into it. The people were to inquire of the law 
from their mouth, and that in respect to civil as well as 
religious matters ; and they were appointed to teach Jacob 
God's judgments and Israel his laws, "even all the statutes 
which the Lord hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses ;" 
Lev. x. 11 ; that is, the forensic laws, as well as the moral and 
ceremonial precepts. 

Hence we are naturally led to conceive of a double use of 
the sacrifices which were offered by the priests in behalf, and 
at the charge of the people ; of which they had a share, as the 
perquisites of their office : I mean, that, besides their typical 
and religious use, they were also intended for the support of 
the state and civil government ; inasmuch as these ministers 
of state were chiefly maintained by them. So that the allot- 
ments to the priests, out of the sacrifices, may be considered 
as designed, like the civil-list money in other nations, for the 
immediate support of the crown and the officers of state. 

On these principles we are enabled to account for Paul 
sacrificing, as we are informed he did, after the commencement 
of the Christian dispensation, Acts xxi. 26; an action which 
has been severely censured by some, as the greatest error of 
his life. Hereby he not only gave, say they, too much coun- 
tenance to the Jews, in their superstitious adherence to the 
law of Moses, after it was abrogated by Christ ; but his offer- 
ing these typical sacrifices, after the antitype of them was 
accomplished in the sacrifice of Christ, was a virtual denial of 
Christ, and of the virtue of his sacrifice, which superseded all 
others. Paul's long trouble, which began immediately after 
this affair, some have looked upon as a judgment of God upon 
him for this great offence. But if this action was really so 
criminal as some suppose, one cannot enough wonder, that so 
good and so wise a man as Paul was should be guilty of it ; 
and that the apostle James, and the other Christian elders, 
should all advise him to it; ver. 18. 23, 24. It is likewise 
strange, that we find no censure ever passed on this action by 

c 



18 



J E WISH AN T 1 Q I IT I E S . 



[boob i. 



any of the sacred writers ; not even by Paul himself, who 
appears so ready, on other occasions, to acknowledge and 
humble himself for his errors and failings. On the contrary, he 
reflects w ith comfort on his having complied with the customs 
of the Jews, in order to remove their prejudice against him 
and his ministry, and against the gospel which he preached, 
and to win them over to embrace it : " Unto the Jews I became 
as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews ; and this I do for the 
gospel's sake;" ICor. ix. 20. 23. 

To elucidate this point, we are to consider, that there was 
a political as well as typical use of sacrifices ; and that though 
the typical ceased upon the sacrifice of Christ, vet the political 
continued, till God in his providence broke up the Jewish 
state and polity, about forty years after our Saviour's death. 
Till that time, it was not merely lawful, but matter of duty, 
for good subjects to pay the dues which were appointed by 
law for the support of the government and magistracy. Now 
of this kind was the sacrifice which Paul offered ; and in this 
view they were paid by Christians, dwelling in Judea, as well 
as by those who still adhered to the Jewish religion. So that, 
upon the whole, this action, for which Paul has been so much 
censured, probably amounts to nothing more than paying the 
tribute due to the magistrate by law ; which the apostle 
enjoins upon all other Christians in all other nations; Rom. 
xiii. 6. 

From this account of the Theocracy, and of the peculiar re- 
lations in which God stood to the Hebrew nation, we may also 
perceive, in what sense, and how far, the Levitical sacrifices 
could make atonement for sin. This they are often said to do ; 
and yet it is asserted in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chap. x. 
4, " that it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats 
should take away sins ;" that is, sins against God as our Crea- 
tor and the Lord of conscience. But, besides the typical re- 
ference which the Jewish sacrifices had to the great atone- 
ment by the sacrifice of Christ, they may be supposed to make 
a proper and equitable atonement for transgressions of the pe- 
culiar law of the Theocracy, or for sins committed against God, 
merely as king of the Jew r s. It is enacted in the law 7 of Moses, 
Lev. v. 15, 16, that if a person " had committed a trespass, 
and sinned through ignorance, in the holy things of the Lord 



CHAP. I.] 



JESHURUN. 



19 



(that is, by applying to his own private use what should have 
been paid to God as king, or to the priests his ministers), he 
should make amends to the full value in money ; adding to it 
a fifth part more, and a ram for a trespass-offering ; with 
which the priest should make atonement for him, and it should 
be forgiven him." Now, in the case of a sin of ignorance, this 
might well be deemed an equitable and full compensation, and 
so a proper atonement for the sin, or trespass. But if this, or 
any other trespass, was committed presumptuously, that is, 
wilfully and audaciously, in contempt of the divine Majesty 
and his authority, that circumstance rendered it a sin against 
God, as the Lord of conscience ; for which therefore no brutal 
sacrifices could atone ; but it is said, " That soul shall be cut 
off from among his people ;" Numb. xv. 30. 

. We have only further to observe, upon this form of govern- 
ment, which was peculiar to the Hebrews, that as God himself 
was their king, so Moses was his viceroy, in whom the supreme 
ecclesiastical as well as civil power, under God, was lodged. 
By him Aaron and his sons were put into the priesthood ; the 
royal palace, or tabernacle, was built by his direction ; by him 
it was consecrated ; he gave the nation the whole body of 
their laws ; he was commander-in-chief of all their forces. All 
this did Moses by commission from God, or rather God did it 
by Moses. So that though the servant of God, yet, as chief 
among men, he is called king in Jeshurun ; Deut. xxxiii. 5. 
For though government by kings, properly so called, was not 
set up till the days of Saul ; yet the title was more ancient, 
and given to persons of high rank and great authority, though 
they were never crowned, never attended with royal pomp, 
nor invested with the regalia : in particular it was applied to 
the Judges. When Abimelech was made judge in Shechem, 
it is said, they made him king, Judges ix. 6; and when there 
was no judge in Israel, it is said, " there was no king;" Judges 
xvii. 6. Thus, in after ages, the Roman dictators likewise, to 
whom Godwin compares the Hebrew judges, are sometimes 
called kings, both by the Latin and Greek historians. It is 
not, therefore, difficult to account for Moses's being called 
king, though he was only God's lieutenant or viceroy. 

But it is not so easy to account for Israel's being called Je- 
shurun. Some derive the word from IWjashar, rectus, just or 

c 2 



20 



J EWISH ANTIQl n [ES. 



[book 1 



righteous, and so make it to signify a righteous people. Mon- 
tanus renders it rectitudo, and so does the Samaritan version. 
But it seems a considerable objection against this sense, that 
Israel is called Jeshurun at the very time that they are up- 
braided with their sins and their rebellion: " Jeshurun waxed 
fat, and kicked," &c. Deut. xxxii. 15. It is replied, Jeshurun 
is the diminutive of "W^ jashar (for nomen auctum in fine eat 
nornen diminutwum), and so imports, that though, in general 
and on the whole, they were a righteous people, yet they were 
not without great faults. 

Perhaps Cocceius has given as probable an interpretation a* 
any. He derives the word from "\w shur, which signifies to 
see, behold, or discover; from whence, in the future tense 
plural, comes nttr* jashuru, which, with the addition of Nun 
paragogicum, makes Jeshurun ; that is, the people who had 
the vision of God. # This makes the name Jeshurun to be 
properly applied to Israel, not only when Moses is called their 
king, but when they are upbraided with their rebellion against 
God ; since the peculiar manifestation which God had made 
of himself to them, was a great aggravation of their ingratitude 
and rebellion. We now proceed to the 

Second period of the Hebrew history ; which commences 
with their entrance into Canaan under the command of Joshua, 
and expires at the long captivity. 

Joshua, the successor of Moses, and captain-general of 
Israel, was of the tribe of Ephraim. His original name was 
y\V\r\ Hosheang, Numb. xiii. 8. It was changed by Moses, 
no doubt by God's command, into yarn* Jehoshuang,\er. 16. 
Now since both these names signify the same, nameiy, a Sa- 
viour, from jftir* jashang, salvavit, he hath saved; it is inquired, 
for what reason his name was thus changed ? To account for 
this, two conjectures are offered. 

First, that it was in order to put an honour upon him, by 
adding one of the letters of the name of Jehovah to his name ; 
as God changed Abram's name into DiTQN Abraham; adding 
n to it, from his own name, say the Jews ; Gen. xvii. 5. Thus 
y?2Nn* Jehoshuang may signify salvator Dei ; and he was made 
even in his name a more eminent type of Christ, who bore 



* Ultima Mosis, sect. 973. 



CHAP. I.] GOVERNMENT UN D E 11 JOSHUA. 



21 



the same name with him, Jesus, or Joshua ; and who is 
called, Luke iii. 6, o-wrrjptov rov 0cou, " the salvation of 
God." # But if this reason for the change of Joshua's name 
be thought too cabalistical, 

The second may, perhaps, be more satisfactory ; viz. that the 
name Hosheang comes from the imperative of hiphil, and 
signifies, save ; and perhaps his parents, by giving it, meant 
to express their wish, that he might prove a saviour to Israel. 
ButyW)?v> Jehoshuang comes from the future tense, and signifies 
salvabit, will save. So that Moses, by making this change, 
predicted and promised what his parents had wished. 

Joshua had been Moses's minister, Josh. i. 1, and had at- 
tended upon him in his highest employments. When he was 
called up by Jehovah into the mount, to receive the two tables 
of the law, it is said, that " Moses rose up, and his minister 
Joshua;" Exod. xxiv. 13. And he is said " to stand before 
Moses/' Deut. i. 38, not surely as a menial servant, but as 
his first minister ; for Joshua was one of the heads of the 
children of Israel, and a ruler in his tribe ; as were all the 
twelve spies whom Moses sent to search out the land of Ca- 
naan, of which number Joshua was ; Numb. xiii. 2, 3. 8. He 
only and Caleb brought a good and true report of that land, 
encouraging the people to invade it, and assuring them of suc- 
cess, Numb. xiv. 6 — 9 ; while the other ten gave such a dis- 
couraging account of the gigantic stature and valour of the 
inhabitants, of the number and strength of their fortified towns, 
and perhaps also of the unhealthiness of their country (which 
seems to be their meaning in saying, that " the land eateth 
up the inhabitants thereof"), Numb. xiii. 32, that the people 
were disheartened, and inclined to make themselves a captain, 
and return into Egypt; Numb. xiv. 2 — 4. God was here- 
upon so much displeased, because they showed such ingrati- 
tude and infidelity, notwithstanding the many wonders he had 
wrought for them in Egypt, and in the desart, and notwith- 
standing the repeated assurances he had given them of the 
conquest of Canaan, that he sentenced all of them who were 
twenty years of age and upwards, except Caleb and Joshua, 
to wander in the wilderness for forty years, till they were con- 



* Vid. Alting. de Cabalist. 



22 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



sumed ; that none of them might enter into the promised land. 
And as for those to whose false reports this rebellion was 
owing, they were all destroyed by a sudden death ; ver. 36, 
37. But as for Joshua, he not only lived till the Israelites 
entered into the land of Canaan, but had the honour, as their 
captain-general, to conduct them. He had before been ap- 
pointed Moses's successor by the oracle, or by Jehovah him- 
self, and had been solemnly ordained to that office, while 
Moses was living, Numb, xxvii. 15 — 23; and after his death 
the people acknowledged him for his successor, promising to 
pay him the same obedience which they had paid to Moses ; 
Josh. i. 16, 17. However, though he succeeded Moses, as 
God's viceroy or lieutenant, and had the same authority, mili- 
tary and civil, which his predecessor had ; yet, in some re- 
spects he was much inferior to him ; and therefore he could 
not be " that prophet, like unto Moses, whom God had pro- 
mised to raise up unto his brethren," Deut. xviii. 15, as the 
modern Jews affirm, and some Christians have too easily 
granted, he was. For, besides that he had not the honour of 
being a lawgiver, as Moses had (by whom the whole body of 
laws which God intended for his people, was delivered), I 
say, besides this, he was never admitted to that immediate 
and familiar manner of conversing with God, with which Moses 
was favoured ; for " with him the Lord spake face to face, as 
a man speaks to his friend," Exod. xxxiii. 11; whereas when 
Joshua wanted to consult the oracle, he was to stand before 
the Spriest, who should ask counsel for him after the judg- 
ment of Urim Numb, xxvii. 21. In both these respects, 
neither Joshua, nor any other prophet, was " like unto Moses 
except he to whom that prophecy is applied by the apostle 
Peter, Acts iii. 20 — 22, and in whom alone it was accom- 
plished, even our Lord Jesus Christ. 

Our author says, that after Joshua succeeded Judges. But 
it may be questioned, whether the judges were properly suc- 
cessors to Joshua, in the same office, as he had been to Moses. 
For, as the law had been given by Moses, and as the land of 
Canaan had been conquered, and the tribes of Israel settled 
in the peaceable possession of their inheritance, by Joshua ; 
there seems to have been no further occasion for " a man to 
be set over the congregation, who might go out before them, 



( HAP. I.] 



JUDGES. 



23 



and who might go in before them, and who might lead them 
out, and who might bring them in," which was the office of 
Joshua; Numb, xxvii. 16, 17. As, therefore, the legislative 
office which Moses had possessed, expired at his death, so did 
the office of Joshua, as prefect us ordinarius, and captain-ge- 
neral for life, at his. Hereupon the Hebrew government be- 
came aristocratical * excepting that, in respect to the peculiar 
supremacy of Jehovah, it was monarchical.* 

In the Hebrew commonwealth, every city had its elders, 
who formed a court of judicature, w ith a power of determining 
lesser matters in their respective districts. The rabbies say, 
there were three such elders, or judges, in each lesser city, 
and twenty-three in greater. But Josephus speaks of seven 
judges in each, without any such distinction of greater or less.f 
We often read in Scripture of the elders of the cities; but 
the number of them is not determined ; probably that was left 
discr<?tional. For instance, we read of the elders of Gilead, 
who went to fetch Jephthah and make him their captain, 
Judges xi. 5, 6 ; of the elders of Succoth, Judges viii. 14 ; and 
of the elders of Bethlehem, where Boaz lived ; Ruth iv. 2. 
4. 9, compared with chap. i. 1. In short, that there were 
elders in every city, appears from the law, directing and regu- 
lating the conduct of the elders of any city, on occasion of a 
person's being found dead in or near it; Deut. xxi. 1 — 9. Si- 
goniusj supposes these elders and judges of cities were the 
original constitution settled in the wilderness by Moses, upon 
the advice which Jethro gave him, Exod. xviii. 21, 22; and 
continued by divine appointment after the settlement in the 
land of Canaan. Whereas others imagine the Jethronian pre- 

* Aristocracy (so called from aptarros, optimus, and /c/jotcw impero) im- 
ports, that the supreme government is lodged in the optbnates, or nobles. 
Such is the present form of government in Venice and in Holland. Demo- 
cracy (from foi^os, populus, and /cpoTew, impero) means, that the supreme au- 
thority is in the people, who exercise it by persons of their own order. Such 
is the government of Basil, and of some of the free cities of Germany. 
Monarchy (from /xovos, solus, and apxn, imperium) is, when the supreme au- 
thority is lodged in a single person, as in France and Spain. The English con- 
stitution is plainly a mixture of all three, inasmuch as the supreme authority 
is lodged jointly in the king, the lords, and the commons. 

f Antiq. lib. iv. cap. viii. sect. xiv. edit. Haverc. 

X De Repub. Heb. lib. vi. cap. vi. 



24 



JEWISH AN T EQUITIES. 



[liOOK [. 



fectures were a peculiar constitution, suited to their condition 
while encamped in the wilderness, but laid aside after they 
came into Canaan. However that be, it is certain there was 
a court of judges and officers appointed in every city by the 
law of Moses ; Deut. xvi. 18. How far, and in what respects, 
these judges differed from the eiders of the city, is not easily 
determined ; and whether they were different persons, or the 
same. Perhaps the title elders, may denote their seniority 
and dignity; and that of judges, the office they sustained. 

As for the officers, DVTOltf shoterim, mentioned along with the 
judges, # they were, according to the account given of them by 
Maimonides and the rabbins, much like those whom the Ro- 
man law calls officiates et executores, and the New Testament 
7rpatcTopag, Luke xii. 58, who attended the court, to keep the 
people in order, with a staff and a whip, and to execute the 
orders and decrees of the judges. Josephus styles themf bai- 
liffs or officers under the judges ; and we find them, on* some 
occasions, employed as public cryers : Deut. xx. 5. 8, 9 ; Josh, 
i. 10, 11. However, the rabbies place them next under their 
wise men and doctors, and above their scribes or clerks. And 
indeed they seem to have been persons of some consideration, 
by Joshua's assembling them along with the elders, heads, and 
judges ; not to hold any court of justice, but to hear his fare- 
well charge and exhortation before his death ; Josh, xxiii. 2 ; 
xxiv. 1. 

The lower courts of justice, in their several cities, were held 
in their gates : " Judges and officers shalt thou make in all thy 
gates;" Deut. xvi. 18. The gate among the Hebrews seems 
to answer to the forum among the Romans, and to the ayopa 
among the Greeks, which was the name given to any common 
place of resort, whether for the keeping of markets or the 
holding courts of judicature. In the former sense, the word 
gate is used, when Elisha foretels at what low rates provisions 
would be sold on the morrow, in the gate of Samaria ; 2 Kings 
vii. 1. According to the latter sense, Israel is exhorted to 
" execute the judgment of truth and peace in her gates," 
Zech. viii. 16 ; and so in the law we are now explaining, they 

* See Patrick on the text last cited. 

f Ubi supra. See also Matt. v. 25, where 'vn-qperris is used in the same 
sense as it is by Josephus. 



CHAP. I.J 



THE SANHEDRIM* 



25 



are commanded to " make judges and officers in their gates." 
In either sense, that is, as denoting in general a place of 
public concourse, the word is used, when it is said of the vir- 
tuous woman, " Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let 
her own works praise her in the gates;" Prov. xxxi. 31. 

Each tribe had its respective prince. They are called the 
heads of the thousands of Israel, Numb. x. 4; and were the 
same, perhaps, with the twelve captains of the host mentioned 
in the second chapter of Numbers ; and their office, therefore, 
related chiefly, if not entirely, to military affairs. 

We read also of the princes of the congregation, who pre- 
sided in judiciary'matters, Numb, xxxii. 2; Josh. ix. 5; xvii. 4. 
These probably were the same with the Jethronian prefectures, 
of whom we spake before, and who are called elders, and also 
princes and nobles, on account of the dignity of their office ; 
Exod.xxiv. 9. 11. They were in number seventy, as appears 
by the account of their institution, which we have in the book 
of Numbers, chap . xi . 1 6, 1 7 . 24, 25 ; though I rather apprehend 
that to bean account of their being confirmed in their office, and 
perhaps invested with some additional authority, and endowed 
with some miraculous gift to qualify them for it ; for we find 
there were seventy elders before, at the time of giving the 
law at mount Sinai; Exod. xxiv. 1.9. 14. 

Whether the consistory of seventy elders was a perpetual, 
or only a temporary institution, is a matter of dispute. The 
Jews, and after them Grotius, Selden, Lightfoot, and several 
other Christians, have affirmed, it was the same that became 
afterward so famous under the name of the Sanhedrim ; to 
which even their kings and high-priests were subject. But 
others conceive the institution of the seventy elders was only 
temporary, for the assistance of Moses in the government, 
before the settlement in the land of Canaan; and that the 
Sanhedrim was first set up in the time of the Maccabees. 

On the former side, the rabbies are zealous assertors of the 
high antiquity of the Sanhedrim; and though they allow, that 
its session was sometimes interrupted and discontinued for 
years together, especially in the times of the kings; they leave 
no stone unturned to prove, that the court, nevertheless, sub- 
sisted from the time of Moses. 

The first argument they produce is taken from this passage 



26 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [liOOK J. 

in the book of Numbers, chap. xi. 16: " The Lord said unto 
Moses, Gather unto me seventy of the elders of Israel;" 
which the Talmud interprets, that " they may be a Sanhedrim 
to my land that is, a holy, standing, perpetual council, 
throughout all generations. For wherever we meet with the 
word *V li, unto me; the rabbies think it signifies a thing esta- 
blished by God to all generations. For instance, when he 
says of Aaron and his sons, <e They shall minister unto me in 
the priests' office," Exod. xxviii. 41 ; and of the Levites, 
" They shall be mine," or unto me, Numb. iii. 12 ; and of the 
whole nation, " Unto me the children of Israel are servants," 
Lev. xxv. 55; and when the like is said of the sanctuary, the 
sacrifices, the altar, and many other things ; in all these cases 
they understand the word sb li to import a perpetual institu- 
tion. 

2dly. It is argued, that if Moses needed the assistance of 
such a council, much more was it requisite after his death ; and 
it is by no means probable, that any one would presume to 
abrogate so prudent an institution of his, in any age after him. 

3dly. We read of the elders and judges of Israel, not only 
after the death of Moses, but after the Israelites were settled 
in the land of Canaan: Josh. xxiv. 1 ; Judges ii. 7- Now by 
these the rabbies understand the seventy elders, or Sanhe- 
drim ; and to the same purpose they interpret a passage of the 
Psalmist concerning the " thrones of judgment," that are " set," 
or do sit, in Jerusalem, Psalm cxxii. 5. The like reference to 
the Sanhedrim they find in the title of the forty-fifth Psalm, 
where the Targum interprets shoshannim, those that sit in the 
Sanhedrim of Moses. And thus Dr. Lightfoot understands 
the expression concerning the Scribes and Pharisees, who are 
said to sit in Moses's seat, Matt, xxiii. 2 ; that is, in the San- 
hedrim, which was instituted by Moses. 

4thly. In order to prove, not only that the Sanhedrim sub- 
sisted in the days of Zedekiah, but likewise that its power 
and authority were superior to the king's, they allege the 
following passage of the prophet Jeremy: " Therefore the 
princes said unto the king, We beseech thee, let this man be 
put to death ; for," &c. " Then Zedekiah the king said, Behold, 
he is in your hand ; for the king is not he that can do any 
thing against you;" Jer. xxxviii. 4, 5. By the princes here 



CHAP. 1.] 



THE SANHEDRIM. 



27 



spoken of they understand the elders, or members of the 
Sanhedrim. 

These are the chief arguments which are produced to prove 
that the Sanhedrim, so famous in the latter ages of the Jewish 
polity, was instituted by Moses, and always subsisted after 
his time. 

On the other side, several arguments are brought to show, 
that the court of the Sanhedrim was of no higher antiquity 
than the time of the Maccabees, and was then first set up. 
The first is, 

That we do not find in Scripture one word of any such 
high court, either in the times of the judges, or of the kings ; 
and it is as preposterous to suppose a Jewish historian should 
not mention the Sanhedrim, if such a court there were in 
those times, as that a Latin historian should write a history 
of the Roman affairs without ever mentioning the Senate. 

2ndly. We find, in perusing their history, that the people 
generally followed the king, whether in the practice of ido- 
latry, or in the worship of Jehovah ; which it is hard to ac- 
count for, if such a court had then subsisted, with an authority 
superior to that of the king. 

3dly. It plainly appears, that both the judges and the kings 
exercised a despotic power, and did all things according to 
their own will, without consulting the Sanhedrim ; as doubt- 
less they would and must have done, if such a court of supe- 
rior authority had then existed : " And he said, This will be 
the manner of the king that shall reign over you, he will take 
your sons, and appoint them for himself," &c; 1 Sam. viii. 11. 
See also 2 Sam. x. 2 ; and 1 Kings iii. 16 — ult. 

4thly. It is said in the book of Judges, that " in those days 
there was no king in Israel ; therefore every man did that 
which was right in his own eyes Judges xvii. 6; xxi. 25. 
But if there had been such a national court as is pretended, 
of superior authority to a king, or a judge, there being "no 
king" could not have been assigned as the reason of the peo- 
ple's living without any government. 

5thly. The story of the Levite, who was so vilely abused 
at Gibeah, sending an account of his wrongs to the twelve 
tribes, Judges xix. 29, 30, evidently shows there was then no 



28 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



such national court as the Sanhedrim ; for if there had been 
so, to that he would naturally have applied . 

Upon the whole, then, it appears most probable, that the 
institution of the seventy elders was only temporary, to assist 
Moses during the abode of the Israelites in the wilderness ; 
and perhaps also to assist Joshua, till they were settled in 
Canaan ; but that afterward they assembled no more, and 
that the Sanhedrim, so famous in later ages, was set up in the 
time of the Maccabees. 

As for the judges, which we read of after the death of 
Joshua, they seem to be raised up and appointed only on 
particular occasions ; but were not pr&fecii ordinarii, like 
Moses and Joshua ; nor were they continued in their office 
during life, but only as long as there was occasion ; for in- 
stance, to deliver Israel from the power of some oppressor. 
Only it is said, that " Samuel judged Israel all the days of his 
life;" which seems to be mentioned as a particular case; 
1 Sam. vii. 15. As for the other judges, Godwin compares 
them to the Roman dictators, who were appointed only on 
extraordinary emergencies, as in case of war abroad, or con- 
spiracies at home, and whose power, while they continued in 
office, was great, and even absolute. Thus the Hebrew 
judges seem to have been appointed only in cases of national 
trouble and danger. Othniel, the first judge, was raised up 
to deliver Israel from the oppression of Chusan-rishathaim ; 
Judges iii. 8 — 10 : Ehud, the second, to deliver them from the 
power of Moab, who had oppressed them eighteen years ; 
Judges iii. 14, 15; and Gideon, on occasion of their oppression 
by the Midianites ; Judges vi. 33, 34. 

The power of the judges, while in their office, was very 
great ; as appears from Gideon's punishing the elders of Suc- 
coth ; Judges viii. 16. Though their power does not seem to 
have been limited to a certain time, as that of the Roman 
dictators, which continued for half a year ; yet it is reasonable 
to suppose, that when they had performed the business for 
which they were appointed, they retired to a private life. This 
Godwin infers from Gideon's refusing to take upon him the 
perpetual government of Israel, as being inconsistent with the 
Theocracy; Judges viii. 23. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE JUDGES. 



29 



That the judges were not properly successors to Joshua in 
his office, as not being prafecti ordinarii, is argued, 

1st. From there being no mention of the appointment of a 
successor to Joshua, as there was to Moses; nor any one 
actually made judge till some years after his death, when 
Othniel was raised to that office on a particular occasion. 

2dly. From its being represented as so criminal a thing for 
the people to desire a king, and even to amount to a <e reject- 
ing God, that he should not reign over them;" 1 Sam. viii. 
5 — 7. Now the difference betwixt judges and kings was but 
very little. They seem to have had the same authority and 
power; only the judges were never crowned, nor attended 
with such pomp, nor invested with such regalia as kings were : 
if therefore the judges had been perpetual dictators, succeed- 
ing one another regularly and without intermission, why should 
the people desire a king ; or where was the great evil of it 
when they did? Was it the sole purport of their request, 
that their judges might have the title of kings? They had 
this before; for when there was no judge, it is said " there 
was no king in Israel/' Or was it only, that their judges 
might be crowned, and have the regalia? This was a matter 
of very little moment, and hardly worth disputing about. Their 
desire, then, plainly was, that they might have a judge, or 
king, in perpetuum, as the stated supreme officer in the go- 
vernment, like other nations ; and not merely on extraordinary 
occasions. Now this was altering the constitution and form 
of government which God had established ; and on this ac- 
count their motion was so displeasing to Samuel, and to God 
himself. 

However, on the other hand, in order to prove the judges 
were perpetual dictators, and in their office quite different 
from kings, it is objected and argued, 

1st. That Samuel had made his sons judges, 1 Sam. viii. 1 ; 
and it was nothing but the ill government of these new judges 
that made the people desire a king, ver. 3 — 5. Therefore 
the kingly office was different from that of the judges; conse- 
quently the judges might have been perpetual dictators, not- 
withstanding the people now desired a king. 

But to this it may be answered, that the title judge was 
usually applied, not only to the one supreme officer under 



30 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



God, such as Othniel, Barak, 8cc, but also to inferior magis- 
trates ; Josh. viii. 33; xxiii. 2, and elsewhere. Now it is not 
said, that Samuel made one of his sons the judge, kclt t^o^y, 
that is, by appointing him to be his successor, or his partner in 
the government ; but that he made them both judges; and they 
were judges in Beersheba, that is, inferior magistrates, whose 
office it was to dispense and execute the laws of Jehovah. 

2dly. It is alleged, that the judge, kut t£ox»?v, is spoken of 
as a stated officer in the Hebrew commonwealth : " Thou shalt 
come unto the priests, the Levites, and unto the judge that 
shall be in those days;" Deut. xvii. 9. Consequently there 
must always be a judge. 

But those on the other side of the question reply, that 
tODi^n bx) veel hassophet may as well be rendered "or unto 
the judge;" meaning, in case there should be any judge at 
that time. And this sense they apprehend is confirmed by 
its being said, " The man that will not hearken to the priest, 
or to the judge, even that man shall die," ver. 12. 

3dly. The chasm or interregnum betwixt Samson and Sa- 
muel, when there was no judge, is mentioned once and again 
as an extraordinary thing, and a calamitous circumstance to 
the nation ; Judges xvii. 6; xviii. 1; xix. 1; xxi. 25. There- 
fore, ordinarily, there was one supreme judge over all the 
other officers and ministers of state. 

But it is replied, this will not prove that they had per- 
petual judges; but only that it was a calamity to be without a 
judge at a time when such an officer was so much wanted. 

It is made a question, what time that was which is here re- 
ferred to, when " there was no king, or judge, in Israel." 
The order of the history leads us to conceive, it was betwixt 
Samson and Samuel. But Dr. Patrick is of opinion, that 
those five last chapters of the book of Judges are a distinct 
history, in which the author gives an account of several me- 
morable transactions which fell out in or about the time of 
the judges, whose story he would not interrupt by intermixing 
these matters with it, and therefore reserved them to be re- 
lated by themselves, in the second part, or appendix. Where- 
in he first gives an account how idolatry crept into the tribe 
of Ephraim, then how it was propagated among the Danites; 
after which he relates a most heinous act of adultery, com- 



CHAP. i.] jephthah's vow. 31 

mitted in the tribe of Benjamin; which introduces the history, 
first, of the almost total destruction of that tribe for their 
countenancing that detestable fact; and then, of its restora- 
tion. Now, on such extraordinary occasions, they should 
have appointed a judge, especially when the inferior officers 
so shamefully neglected their duty. 

These Hebrew judges were in all fifteen, from Othniel the 
first to Samuel the last; before whose death the form of 
government was changed, and Saul was made king. 

We may remark, that the Carthaginian Suffites, the chief 
officers and magistrates in that state, whom both the Greek 
and Latin historians frequently mention,*' seem evidently to 
have derived their title from the Hebrew word DHDDitf skophe- 
tim : which affords one argument, among several others, of the 
Carthaginians being originally Canaanites, driven out of their 
country by Joshua ; since by this it appears, that their ancient 
language was Hebrew, the language of the Canaanites.f 

Procopius Gazseus observes, that the history of the judges 
is of excellent use to represent to us the mighty power of true 
religion to make a nation happy, and the dismal calamities 
which impiety brings upon it. And, therefore, the writer of 
the Epistle to the Hebrews has thought fit to propound several 
examples of the power of faith out of this book; as of Gideon, 
Barak, Samson, Jephthah, and Samuel; who, being animated 
by this principle, did great things for their nation, and obtained 
signal victories over their enemies. J 

There is no affair related in this book, which has been made 
so much a matter of controversy, as that of Jephthah's vow ; 
which, therefore, we shall now take into consideration. 

Concerning Jephthah's Void. 

It has been earnestly disputed, both among Jews and Chris- 
tians, whether Jephthah did sacrifice his daughter. And very 
considerable men have appeared on each side of this question. 
Not but if Jephthah had been a heathen, I suppose, we should. 

* Livii Hist. lib. xxviii. cap. 37; lib. xxx. cap. 7. 

f Vid. Bochart. Geograp. Sacr. part ii. lib. i. cap. xxiv. apud Opera, torn, 
i. p. 473. edit. Lugd. Bat. 1712. 

% Patrick on Judges, at the beginning. 



32 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 1 . 



have had no more difficulty in understanding the account 
given of this matter in the book of Judges, chap, xi., of his 
sacrificing his daughter, than we have in understanding Ho- 
mer's account of Agamemnon's sacrificing his daughter Iphi- 
genia, or Idomeneus his son, of a real -sacrifice. I do not 
know that it is so much as pretended, that the Hebrew text 
will not admit of such a sense, or even that it is not the most 
natural one which the words will bear. But that a judge of 
the Hebrew nation, who were worshippers of the true God, 
and whose law did not admit of human sacrifices, should be 
guilty of this grossest act of heathen superstition, is what se- 
veral of the Jewish rabbies can by no means admit; and many 
learned Christians, not knowing how to reconcile such a bar- 
barous, as well as superstitious, murder with the good cha- 
racter which is given of Jephthah in the Epistle to the He- 
brews, chap. xi. 32 (where his name stands in the catalogue 
of those ancient worthies who were illustrious instances of the 
power of faith), have endeavoured to soften the account of this 
inhuman sacrifice, and to introduce a milder sense. For this 
purpose the art of criticism hath been diligently applied to the 
Hebrew text, in order to make it signify no more than that 
Jephthah devoted his daughter to perpetual virginity, for the 
honour and in the service of God. Among the Jews, rabbi 
Joseph, and rabbi David Kimchi, and rabbi Levi Ben Ger- 
son, # have espoused this side of the question ; as among the 
Christian writers, have Estius, Vatablus, Junius, Grotius, 
Drusius, Heinsius, Glassius, and Le Clerc. 

In favour of the milder sense, that Jephthah devoted his 
daughter to perpetual virginity, it is alleged, 

1st. That she desired time, before the vow was performed 
upon her, to bewail her virginity, not the loss of her life, 
Judges xi. 37. From whence it is concluded, that it was not 
death, but perpetual virginity that she was devoted to suffer ; 
and the reason, they say, why Jephthah was so troubled when 
his daughter met him, ver. 35, was, because she being his only 
child, ver. 34, and he now obliged by his vow to devote her to 
perpetual virginity, his family would soon be extinct in Israel. 
But to this it is replied, that to die childless was accounted 

* Selden. de jure nat. et gent. lib. iv. cap. xi. 



CHAP. I.] 



JEPHTHAH'S VOW. 



33 



by the Jews a very sad calamity. Henc^ it was denounced 
as a heavy curse on Coniah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of 
Judah : "Thus saith the Lord, Write this man childless ;" 
Jer. xxii. 30. And therefore Jephthah's daughter bewailed 
her virginity, or her dying childless, more than the loss of her 
life. 

2dly. It is alleged, in favour of the notion of her being de- 
voted to perpetual virginity, that the words, nnD^-rQ^ nun*? 
hthannoth lebath Jephthah, Judges xi. 40, which we render, 
" to lament the daughter of Jephthah," should be rendered, 
as in the margin, "to talk with the daughter of Jephthah;" 
that is, to visit and comfort her in her recluse life. To sup- 
port this sense of the word rmrr? hthannoth, they allege the 
following expression in this book of Judges, "There shall 
they rehearse the righteous acts of the Lord," Judges v. 1 1 ; 
where, they observe, the verb H3H thana is rightly rendered, 
and can only mean, to rehearse. 

But to this argument it is replied, that, allowing this sense 
of the verb, it will not at all contradict the notion of her being 
sacrificed ; for then the meaning of this passage will be, that 
" the daughters of Israel went yearly to rehearse the tragical 
story of the daughter of Jephthah." Or even if we render 
the word mn thana, as in the margin, to talk ; yet rdh nnnb 
hthannoth lebath would rather signify to "talk concerning," 
than to " talk with" as ^-viDN imri-li, is to " say of me," 
or "concerning me," not "with me," Gen. xx. 13; and 
■j^-ni^ jetzavveh-lak signifies, "he shall give charge con- 
cerning thee," not "with thee;" Psalm xci. 11. And thus 
nnD^-roV JlMrb hthannoth lebath Jephthah, signifies to talk 
concerning the daughter of Jephthah, and not with her. So 
that this critique is not at all inconsistent with the notion of 
her being sacrificed, but rather confirms it. 

3dly. The chief critical argument in favour of her being 
devoted to perpetual virginity, is taken from this clause in Jep- 
thah's vow, Judges xi. 31, nVm "inwVmym rmh n>m vehaja 
laihova vehangnalithihu gnolath: where, they say, the Vau 
should be understood not copulatively, but disjunctively; and 
then the meaning is, "Whatsoever cometh to meet me, shall 
either be the Lord's, or I will offer it up for a burnt-offering;" 
that is, in case it should be a creature fit for sacrifice. Thus 

D 



34 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[ROOK 1. 



Glassius, in his Philologia Sacra, understands it; and so Dru- 
sius, and several others; and they produce some other texts, 
where the Vau is used disjunctively; as where it is said, 
" He that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be 
put to death;" Exod. xxi. 17, compared with Matt. xv. 4. 
Again, " Asahel turned not to the right-hand, or to the left," 
2 Sam. ii. 19; where the Vau cannot signify and. In like 
manner the conjunctive que, in Latin, is sometimes used in a 
disjunctive sense. Thus Virgil — 

Aut Pelago Danaum insidias, suspectaque dona 
Praecipitare jubent, subjectisque urere flammis. 

TEneid ii. 1. 37. 

Again, 

Saxum ingens volvunt alii, radiisque rotarum 
Districti pendent. 

iEneid vi. 1. 61G. 

Now, taking the Vau in this sense in the passage before us, 
the meaning will be, "I will devote it to God, or it shall be 
offered for a burnt-offering." 

But to this it is replied, that every thing sacrificed was 
offered or devoted to God ; but every thing devoted to God 
was not sacrificed. Therefore it would be as improper to say, 
I will either devote it to God, or offer it in sacrifice, as it 
would be to say, animal aut homo ; or, homo aut Petrus ; 
or, I will ride either on a four-footed beast or a horse ; because 
a horse is a four-footed beast. 

Besides, in other parallel texts, where vows are expressed, 
like this of Jepththah's, and where the Vau is used in the 
same manner as it is here, nobody will suppose it should be 
taken disjunctively. As in Hannah's vow, 1 Sam. i. 11; "I 
will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life, and there 
shall no razor come upon his head;" nobody understands it 
thus, " I will either give him to the Lord, or no razor shall 
come upon his head." So in Jacob's vow, "Then shall the 
Lord be my God; and this stone, which I have set up for a 
pillar, shall be God's house;" Gen xxviii. 21, 22. 

You see, then, that the words of the Hebrew text will hardly 
bear any other sense than is agreeable to the more common 
opinion, that Jephthah did devote his daughter to death, and 
actual lv sacrifice her. 



CHAP. I.] 



jephthah's VOW. 



35 



However, let us attend to the reasons which some have 
offered, why the text should be interpreted in the milder sense, 
even though it should oblige us to depart from the more natu- 
ral meaning and construction of the words. 

1st. Some of the Jewish rabbies seem to think it necessary, 
for the honour of their nation, to vindicate Jephthah's charac- 
ter at any rate from the blemish of murder, which, if com- 
mitted, must have been a double or triple crime, as a murder, 
as a most unnatural murder of his own daughter and only child, 
and also as a heathenish rite of sacrificing, which the Lord 
God did by no means permit. But, surely, it is hardly worth 
their while to labour so earnestly, as some of them have done, 
to vindicate Jephthah's character for the sake of their national 
honour, while the lives and actions of so many of their wicked 
kings are on record in the sacred history, particularly of Ahaz, 
who " made his son to pass through the fire according to the 
abominations of the heathen," 2 Kings xvi. 3 ; of Manasseh, 
who " caused his children to pass through the fire in the valley 
of the son of Hinnom," 2 Chron. xxxiii. 6* ; which, if it did not 
mean their burning them to death, in sacrifice to their idols, 
was at least a rite of lustration (as the heathens called it), by 
which parents dedicated their children to the worship and ser- 
vice of their false gods. 

2dly. It is pleaded, that Jephthah is not censured in any 
part of sacred history for what he did on this occasion, which, 
they suppose, if he had been guilty of so abominable a crime 
as sacrificing his own daughter, he would have been. 

To this it may be replied, that if every action, mentioned in 
the sacred history without censure, must therefore be con- 
cluded to be lawful and good, many actions, which we are 
sure were contrary to the positive law of God, and others 
which were immoral in their own nature, must be held lawful. 
As Samson's marrying a Philistine contrary to the law, which 
forbad the Jews to marry out of their own nation ; his lewd- 
ness with Dalilah ; and his revengeful spirit, which he mani- 
fested to the last, and carried to such an extreme as to sacri- 
fice his own life, that he might "be avenged on the Philistines 
for his two eyes." Another argument against the more literal 
sense of this history is, 

3dly. It cannot be thought that God would have given 

d 2 



36 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



victory and success to Jephthah in his expedition against the 
Ammonites, upon his making so wicked a vow as this, of 
offering a human sacrifice. 

But it is to be considered, that the private interest of Jeph- 
thah was not so much concerned in this expedition as the 
public interest of the whole Jewish nation ; and why might 
not God succeed him in his war against the Ammonites, not- 
withstanding his faults, for the sake of delivering his favourite 
people, whom he had taken under his special protection, as in 
many other cases he hath given success to wicked instruments, 
for accomplishing the wise and holy designs of his providence 
and grace ? But, 

4thly. The chief reason which has induced many Christians 
to soften the story of Jephthah's unnatural murder and sacri- 
fice, is his being mentioned in the catalogue of believers, in the 
Epistle to the Hebrews, chap. xi. 32. From whence it is con- 
cluded, that he was not merely a good man, but a man of emi- 
nent piety, as all whose names are in that catalogue are sup- 
posed to be. And, taking this for granted, they argue, How 
can it be thought that a good man, nay, an eminently good 
man, should deliberately commit so horrid a crime, which was 
doubly contrary to the divine law, as to murder and sacrifice 
his own daughter? 

To this it is replied, 

1st. That there are great infirmities and faults of good men 
recorded in Scripture, which, perhaps, considering all circum- 
stances, were as heinous as this action of Jephthah's. As 
David's debauching the wife of Uriah, and then perfidiously 
procuring the death of her husband ; and Solomon's idolatry, 
of whom, though it is not expressly said that he offered any 
human sacrifices, yet we read that he went "after Milcom, 
the abomination of the Ammonites," 1 Kings xi. 5; which is 
another name for Molech, as the same idol is called : he 
"built an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, 
and Molech, the abomination of the children of Amnion;" 
ver. 7. Now it being well known, that human sacrifices were 
commonly offered by the heathens to the idol Molech, it is not 
an improbable inference, from the passages just cited, that 
Solomon offered them. However that be, if Solomon, the son 
of David, who lived in times of great light, and had enjoyed 



CHAP. I.] 



jephthah's VOW. 



3? 



the advantage of a religious education far beyond what Jeph- 
thah had done ; if he practised the idolatrous worship of the 
Moabites and Ammonites, is it any wonder Jephthah should 
be led by a blind superstition to sacrifice his daughter? It is 
certain Jephthah had had, comparatively, but mean advantages 
for the knowledge of religion, and the law of God. In his 
younger days he dwelt at Gilead, on the other side Jordan, 
very remote from Shiloh, where the tabernacle was, where the 
public ordinances of divine worship were celebrated, and which, 
therefore, in those times, was the fountain of knowledge 
and religion among the Jews. After his father's death, his 
brethren drove him out of the family, upon which he went and 
dwelt in the land of Tob, a country no where else mentioned 
in Scripture, but it was, undoubtedly, out of Canaan, and 
therefore a heathen country. And now, when he returned into 
the land of Israel, the true religion was even there at a very 
low ebb, according to the account we have of the state of it 
amongst the Israelites in those days : " The children of Israel 
did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim and 
Ashtaroth, and the gods of Syria, and the gods of Zidon, and 
the gods of Moab, and the gods of the children of Amnion, 
and the gods of the Philistines, and forsook the Lord, and 
served him not;" Judges x. 6. And though we read, indeed, 
ver. 16, that they had put away the strange gods, before Jeph- 
thaji's return, yet the knowledge of the law of God could not 
be revived on a sudden. Probably, therefore, as Jephthah 
had lived among the heathen, with whom human sacrifices 
were commonly practised, and had little opportunity of ac- 
quaintance with the law of Jehovah, he might, at that time, 
think the highest honour he could pay to the God of Israel 
was to offer him a human sacrifice. Now, all this considered, 
will not his unavoidable ignorance plead strongly in his excuse ? 
And may we not suppose he was a man of a pious turn, and 
had a zeal for God, though not according to knowledge, when 
he made and performed this vow ? 

2dly. Shall I venture to suggest a query, whether Jeph- 
thah's name, being inserted in the catalogue of believers, or of 
those who are remarkable instances of the power of faith, is 
sufficient to prove that he was a good man? The design of 
this chapter is plainly to show the power of faith in several 



38 



Jewish antiquities. 



[book i. 



different views of it, and as acted on several different objects. 
Therefore, though all the persons whose names are here men- 
tioned, were, no doubt, remarkable instances of the power of 
faith, of one kind or another, yet it is not, perhaps, so certain, 
that they all had justifying and saving faith. 

The first person mentioned in this catalogue is Abel, whose 
faith, as it rendered his sacrifice more acceptable to God than 
that of his brother Cain, must be supposed to respect the pro- 
mised antitype of the ancient expiatory sacrifices, or the atone- 
ment of Christ. Soon after, Noah's faith is celebrated, for his 
believing God's threatenings of the universal deluge ; and then 
the faith of Abraham and the patriarchs, by which they 
" looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and 
maker is God;" and which, therefore, made them easy and 
contented with their sojourning and unsettled condition in 
this world. All these are said to*' die in faith;" Heb. xi. 13. 
After several other names, and instances of the power of faith 
as acted upon particular promises, the apostle mentions some 
of the Jewish heroic generals, whose faith in God's promise, 
of protecting and supporting their nation, inspired them with 
extraordinary courage in fighting for the Israelites against their 
enemies and oppressors, so that " by faith they subdued king- 
doms." Yet, if a man might have the faith of miracles, so as 
to remove mountains, and not be a good man, as the apostle 
elsewhere supposes, 1 Cor. xiii. 2, might he not have this par- 
ticular faith in God's promise of supporting the Israelitish na- 
tion, for which Rahab, and Gideon, and Barak, and Samson, 
and Jephthah, are here celebrated, and at the same time not 
be a good man? 

It will be replied, perhaps, 

1st. That after the catalogue of those names it is added, 
Heb. xi. 38, " of whom the world was not worthy." 

I answer, That seems to be said, not of the victorious gene- 
rals, who are mentioned along with Jephthah, but of another 
class of believers, who are mentioned after them, namely, the 
confessors and martyrs, who had been so unworthily treated 
by the world. 

2dly. Is it not intimated in the two last verses of this 
eleventh chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, that all those 
whose names were before recited are now made perfect? 



CHAP. I.] 



JEPHTHAH S VOW. 



39 



"These all, having obtained a good report through faith, re- 
ceived not the promises, God having provided some better 
thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect." 

We answer, The verb rcXtiwv, and the adjective teXuoq, arc 
applied by the Greek writers to maturity of age ; and thus, in 
the New Testament, reXawv eanv 17 GTtpza rpo^, Heb. v. 
14, " Strong meat is for them that are of full age." Again, 
" In malice be ye children, but in understanding be ye 
men," reXuoi yivEaOe, 1 Cor. xiv. 20. And av^p teXhioq, Eph. 
iv. 13, signifies a perfect or full-grown man.* Now, the 
apostle represents the church under the former dispensation, 
when those persons lived of whom he had been speaking 
before, as in a state of minority, but under the gospel dis- 
pensation as advanced to a state of maturity. The mean- 
ing, therefore, seems to be, that though God had vouch- 
safed some extraordinary measures of faith to particular per- 
sons, under the former dispensation, yet he did not then raise 
his church to that state of maturity to which he had now ad- 
vanced it. 

I shall close this dissertation with some arguments in confir- 
mation of the more commonly received opinion, that Jephthah 
did sacrifice his daughter, and that he intended a human sa- 
crifice when he made this vow. 

Of this sentiment is Josephus, the Chaldee Paraphrast, and 
several famous rabbies. Some of them, indeed, founded their 
opinion on a mistaken sense of this passage in Leviticus, 
" None devoted, which shall be devoted of men, shall be re- 
deemed, but shall surely be put to death," mo moth 
jumath, chap, xxvii. 29. From whence they concluded, that 
in some cases human sacrifices might be offered in conformity 
to the law of God. Whereas that text either means, according 
to Dr. Sykes, that every person who is devoted to the special 
service of God, as Samuel was by his mother, shall not be re- 
deemed, but shall die in that devoted state ; and he gives 
several instances, where noi* J"ttD moth jumath is thus applied 
to a natural death, as when God said unto Adam, ff In the day 
that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die," Gen. ii. 17 ; 
and when the Lord said of the murmuring Israelites, " They 

* See Xenoph.. Cyropsed. lib. i. p. 6, edit. Hutch. 1738, where thiols 
avfyaaiv may be translated, viris adeptis plenum cetatem, full-grown men- 



40 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES 



[BOOK 1 



shall surely die in the wilderness/' Numb. xxvi. 65, though 
they were not sacrificed or executed, but died a natural death ** 
— or else the text in Leviticus, according to Mr. Selden, is to 
be restrained to such as were devoted to death by the ap- 
pointment and law of God ; as the inhabitants of Jericho, 
Josh. vi. 17 ; and such of the Israelites as in case of war did 
not obey military orders, and perform the charge laid upon 
them ; in particular, the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead, who 
complied not with the general summons to go and fight against 
Benjamin, Judges xxi. 5. 8 — 10. And perhaps it may ex- 
tend to all who had been guilty of any crime that was made 
capital by the law of God, and so the design of it was no 
more than to restrain inferior magistrates from pardoning 
capital offenders, which was the prerogative of God only, as 
their king.^ * 

Most of the ancient Christian writers are of opinion, that 
Jephthah actually sacrificed his daughter, and so is Dr. Light- 
foot.;!: 

Now the chief reasons which are alleged in favour of this 
opinion, besides that it agrees to the more natural meaning of 
the Hebrew text, are, 

1st. That there is no rule nor precedent in Scripture, to jus- 
tify the practice of devoting persons to perpetual virginity ; but, 
on the contrary, this is spoken of as one of the antichristian 
corruptions of the " latter times, when men should depart 
from the faith, and give heed to seducing spirits and doctrines 
of devils;" 1 Tim. iv. L Nor was there any office belong- 
ing to the temple service to be performed by women, ex- 
cept, perhaps, that some of the daughters of the Levites as- 
sisted by their voices in the temple choir, as some think is 
intimated in this passage of the first book of Chronicles, "And 
God gave to Heman fourteen sons and three daughters. All 
these were under the hands of their father, for song in the 
house of the Lord, with cymbals, psalteries, and harps, for the 
service of the house of God, according to the king's order, to 
Asaph, Jeduthun, and Heman;" 1 Chron. xxv. 5, 6. How- 

* See Sykes' Principles and Connexion of Natural and Revealed Reli- 
gion, chap. xiii. 

f Selden de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. iv, cap. vi.— -x= 
\ Serm. on Judges xi. 39, vol. ii= p. 1215= 



CHAP. I.] 



JEPHTHAU'S VOW. 



41 



ever, Jephthah was not a Levite, and therefore his daughter 
could bear no part even in that service, nor hath nunnery any 
countenance, either in the Jewish or Christian law ; and to 
suppose, therefore, that Jephthah devoted his daughter to 
perpetual virginity, is to suppose him acting as contrary to 
the law of God, as if he had sacrificed her. 

2dly. What could he expect to come out of the door of his 
house to meet him, but a human person ? Can we think that 
Jephthah had his dog in his thoughts when he made this 
vow, — a creature that was particularly excepted from being in 
any sense sanctified and devoted to God, as any clean beast 
might be ? Lev. xxvii. 9. 11, compared with Deut. xxiii. 18. 

3dly. If he had intended no more than the sacrifice of a 
bullock, or a ram, what need was there of such a solemn vow ? 
If he had meant a brutal sacrifice, he would surely have vowed 
to sacrifice hecatombs, rather than a single animal, on so great 
an occasion ; or, like Jacob, he would have vowed to give the 
" tenth of all his substance unto the Lord Gen. xxviii. 22. 

4thly. We read, that it was a " custom in Israel, that the 
daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of 
Jephthah Judges xi. 39, 40. Now the Hebrew word pn chok, 
which we render custom, signifies a statute or ordinance of 
lasting obligation. Thus it is peculiarly applied to the law 
which God gave by Moses in the following passage : M Behold 
I have taught you statutes (D^pTl chukkim) and judgments, even 
as the Lord my God commanded me, that ye should do so in 
the land whither ye go to possess it. Keep, therefore, and do 
them, for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the 
sight of the nations which shall hear all these statutes," 
D>pnn-^D colrhachuhkim, Deut. iv. 6, and so in many other 
places. This custom, therefore, of the daughters of Israel, 
seems to be intended for an annual rite in perpetuum, and 
not that they went yearly to talk with her as long as she lived. 

It is highly probable, that Homer grounded his fable of 
Agamemnon's sacrificing his daughter Iphigenia on some tra- 
dition of Jephthah's sacrifice. And indeed the name Iphigenia 
seems to be a corruption of Jephthigenia, the daughter of 
Jephthah. Ovid, who has dressed up the story in his way, 
makes Diana put a stag in her room, and seems, therefore, to 
have blended the tradition of Abraham's sacrifice with that of 



42 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Jephthah. # But to return to the consideration of the He- 
brew government. 

We have distinguished the time in which God exercised a 
special authority over the people of Israel into four periods, 
and are now upon the second of them, namely, from their en- 
trance into Canaan to the captivity. We have gone through 
the government of the judges. We proceed now to the reign 
of the kings. 

This continued, saith Godwin, from Saul to the captivity of 
Babylon, about 530 years. But as, in the course of this work, 
we shall have a chapter by itself concerning the Jewish kings, 

1 shall only for the present observe, that they were of two 
sorts, those that reigned over the whole Hebrew nation, who 
were only three, Saul, David, and Solomon, and those that 
reigned over some of the tribes only. 

And these were, 

1st. The kings of the house of David, who were twenty in 
number, if you reckon Athaliah the queen, who usurped the 
throne for six years, after the death of her son Ahaziah ; 

2 Kings xi. These kings reigned over the two tribes of Judah 
and Benjamin, until Nebuchadnezzar carried Zedekiah, the 
last of them, captive unto Babylon. They took their title 
from the larger tribe, and were called kings of Judah. 

2dly. The kings of Israel, who reigned over the other ten 
tribes, from the time of their rebellion against Rehoboam, the 
son of Solomon, to the Assyrian captivity. These kings were 
of several different families, and were in all nineteen, from Je- 
roboam, the first, to Hosea, the last. 

We now proceed to the third period, which takes in the 
time of the captivity, and concludes with the end of it. 

As the Hebrew nation was divided into two distinct king- 
doms, so each kingdom suffered a distinct captivity ; the one 
is called the Assyrian, the other the Babylonish. 

The Assyrian captivity was that of the ten tribes, which was 
begun in the reign of Pekah, king of Israel, when Tiglath- 
Pileser, king of Assyria, conquered a part of his country, and 
carried away the people captive to Assyria ; 2 Kings xv. 29. 
It was afterward completed by Salmanassar, who took Sa- 

f Vid. Capelli Diatrab. de voto Jephth. per totum ; apud criticos sacros 
in Jud. xi., and Mr. Hallet's note on Heb. ix. 32. 



CHAP. 1.] THE BABYLONISH CAPTIVITY. 



43 



maria, the capital of the kingdom of Israel, after three years' 
siege, and went up through the land, and carried away the 
residue of the people captive into Assyria; 2 Kings xvii. 5, 6. 

The people of the kingdom of Israel had greatly corrupted 
the worship of God, and had been very much given to idolatry, 
ever since their separation from the kingdom of Judah. It is 
said, that " they walked in the statutes of the heathen, and 
served idols ;" ver. 8. 12. And it is no wonder, therefore, that, 
when they were removed into Assyria, multitudes of them fell 
in with the idolatrous worship and customs of that country, 
becoming mixed with the Assyrians, and in time losing the 
very name of Jews and Israelites, insomuch that the greater 
part of the ten tribes, as a peculiar people and visible church 
of God, were quite lost in that captivity. 

The Babylonish captivity was that of the kingdom of Judah, 
or of the two tribes who adhered to the house of David. It 
was begun by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, in the reign 
of Jehoiakim, whom Nebuchadnezzar " bound in fetters, to 
carry him to Babylon. And he also carried away some of the 
vessels belonging to the house of the Lord, to furnish his own 
temple in Babylon ;" 2 Chron. xxxvi. 6, 7. From hence be- 
gun the period of the seventy years' captivity. The people, 
buoyed up by their false prophets, were induced to believe, 
that these sacred vessels should be shortly brought again from 
Babylon ; but Jeremiah assured them of the contrary, and that 
all the remaining vessels should be carried after them ; Jer. 
xxvii. 16, 17. 21,22. Accordingly, about nine years afterward, 
in the reign of Jehoiakim, Nebuchadnezzar made a second 
descent against Judah, and " besieged Jerusalem, and took 
it, and carried away the king, and all the nobles, and the 
great men, and officers, and ten thousand captives, to Baby- 
lon, with all the treasure of the house of the Lord, and the 
treasure of the king's house ; and cut in pieces all the vessels 
of gold which Solomon had made for the temple 2 Kings 
xxiv. 10 — 16. But the word fBpVl vaikatzetz is not well ren- 
dered " cut in pieces," since it appears, by a passage in Daniel, 
that these vessels were preserved entire, for " Belshazzar, 
and his princes, his wives, and his concubines, drank wine in 
them ;" Dan. v. 2. The verb yap katzatz signifies " to cut 
off;" as in the following passage of the second book of Samuel, 



44 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I • 



" David commanded his young men, and they slew them, 
that is, Rechab and Baanah, the murderers of Ishbosheth, 
and cut off, ««p%1 vaikatzetzu, their hands and their feet," &c., 
2 Sam. iv. 12; # where it is used in the same form as it is in 
the passage before us, in which, therefore, it can mean no 
more than the vessels being cut off from their stands or 
bases, and taken away from the temple. 

Again, eleven years after this, in the reign of Zedekiah, 
Nebuzar-adan, the Babylonian general, came and sacked and 
burnt Jerusalem, and the temple, and carried away the re- 
mainder of the sacred vessels, together with all the Jews who 
remained in the country (except some poor people, whom he 
left to till the land), captives into Babylon ; 2 Kings xxv. 8. &c. 

Four years after this, which was the twenty-third of the 
seventy, or from the beginning of the Babylonish captivity, 
Nebuzar-adan again invaded the land of Israel, and seized 
upon all the Jews he could meet with, and sent them captive 
to Babylon; Jer. lii. 30. This was done probably in revenge 
for the murder of Gedaliah, whom Nebuchadnezzar had made 
governor of the land, but whom Ishmael killed ; Jer. xli. 2. 
Upon the murder of Gedaliah, Johanan, the son of Kareah, 
and many of the people that were left, fled into Egypt for 
fear of the king of Babylon : ver. 16 — 18; chap, xliii. 4 — 7. 
So that all the Jews that Nebuzar-adan now found, and 
made captive, amounted to no more than seven hundred and 
fifty persons. Thus was the captivity of Judah completed, 
and the land was made desolate, none of its former inhabi- 
tants being now left in it. 

But though the captivity of Israel and of Judah had differ- 
ent beginnings, the former commencing a hundred years be- 
fore the latter; yet they ended together, when Cyrus, the 
king of Persia, having conquered both the Chaldeans and As- 
syrians, and obtained universal monarchy, issued out a decree 
for restoring the Jews to their own land, and for rebuilding 
Jerusalem and the temple ; Ezra i. 1 — 3. This is that famous 
Cyrus, who, one hundred and forty years before the tem- 
ple was destroyed, and two hundred years before he was 

* So also, 2 Kings xvi. 17, Ahaz " cut off" the borders of the bases, &c; 
and, chap, xviii. 16, Hezekiah " cut off" the gold from the doors, &c. Hal- 
let's Notes and Discourses, vol. r. p. 1. 



CHAP. I.] RETURN FROM CAPTIVITY, 



45 



born, was mentioned by name, in the prophecy of Isaiah, as 
designed by God for restoring his people : Isa. xliv. 28 ; 
xlv. 1 — 4. It is not improbable, that prophecy might have 
been shown to Cyrus by some captive Jews, perhaps by 
Daniel, which might be a means of moving him to accomplish 
it. This appears to have been the opinion of the Jews in the 
time of Josephus, which they had probably received by tra- 
dition. For he makes Cyrus say, in his decree, " Because 
the supreme God hath apparently made me king of the world, 
I believe him to be he, whom the people of Israel adore ; for 
he predicted my name by his prophets, and that I should build 
his temple at Jerusalem in the land of Judea."* 

Upon this decree, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin as- 
sembled out of the several provinces of the kingdom of Baby- 
lon, and put themselves under the conduct of Zerubbabel, the 
grandson of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, who was made their 
governor, and of Joshua the high-priest, to the number of 
forty-nine thousand six hundred and ninety-seven persons, 
and returned to their own land ; Ezra ii. And though the ten 
tribes, in their national capacity, were never restored, but the 
most part continue in their dispersion to this day, insomuch 
that the Assyrian captivity put a final period to the kingdom 
of Israel ; yet, as the decree of Cyrus extended to all the Jews, 
several persons belonging to the ten tribes now joined them- 
selves to Judah and Benjamin, and returned with them to 
their own land. We read, therefore, that among the sacri- 
fices offered at the feast of the dedication of the temple, on 
its being rebuilt, there were " twelve he-goats, according to 
the number of the tribes of Israel Ezra vi. 17. Again, we 
read of " twelve bullocks" being sacrificed " for all Israel 
Ezra viii. 35. From whence it is highly probable, that some 
of all the ten tribes were now returned ; though still it appears, 
that great numbers of the Jews, probably most part of the ten 
tribes, who still adhered to the old religion, remained among 
the heathen in the reign of Artaxerxes Longimanus ; whom 
Dr. Prideaux takes to be the Ahasuerus mentioned in the 
book of Esther, and for which opinion he offers substantial 
reasons. This, therefore, must have been near eighty years 



* Antiq. lib. xi. cap. i. sect. i. edit. Haverc. 



46 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



after their first return, in the reign of Cyrus. It was at this 
time that Ezra, a descendant from Seraiah the high-priest, 
and on account of his great learning called the scribe, obtained 
an ample commission from Artaxerxes for his return to Jeru- 
salem, with all of his own nation who were willing to accom- 
pany him; Ezra vii. Upon this, many more of the Jews re- 
turned to their own land. Yet, after all, few of the ten tribes, 
in comparison with those of Judah and Benjamin, ever re- 
turned from their dispersion. It appears, that at the time of 
Hainan's conspiracy, which must have been four or five years 
after the second return under Ezra, there were still a multitude 
of Jews dispersed through the various provinces of the Persian 
empire, besides those who had mingled with idolaters, and 
embraced their religion. Dr. Prideaux thinks it was by the 
favour of Esther that Ezra obtained his commission, and was 
made governor of the Jews in their own land ; which govern- 
ment he exercised for thirteen years. After him succeeded 
Nehemiah, who had a new commission granted him by Ar- 
taxerxes, in the twentieth year of his reign, with full authority 
to repair the wall of Jerusalem, and fortify it, in the same 
manner as before it was dismantled by the Babylonians. 

It may reasonably be conjectured, that queen Esther's in- 
terest with the king did not a little contribute to obtain this 
farther favour for the Jews ; and so much, indeed, seems to 
be hinted in the history of this transaction, where it is par- 
ticularly remarked, that when Artaxerxes gave this new com- 
mission to Nehemiah, " the queen was sitting by him ;" Neh. 
ii. 6. . 

Nehemiah's commission superseded that of Ezra, who there- 
fore now resigned his government, and employed himself in 
collecting and publishing a new and correct edition of the 
Scriptures, and in restoring the worship of God to its original 
purity.* 

We proceed to the fourth period of the Jewish history, 
which contains about six hundred years, from the end of their 
captivity to the destruction of Jerusalem and of the Jewish 
polity. 

The Jews, who, after the return from the captivity, were 

* See Prideaux's Connect, part i. book v. 



CHAP, I.] RETURN FROM CAPTIVITY. 47 



settled again in their own land, were no longer divided into 
two kingdoms, as they were before ; but were all one people, 
and under one government; which yet varied in its form 
through several succeeding ages. 

1st. Upon their return from the captivity, Judea became a 
province of the Persian empire, and was tributary to the Per- 
sian monarch ; as appears from the letter which the enemies 
of the Jews wrote to Artaxerxes, in order to prevent the re- 
building of Jerusalem ; in which are these words, "Be it 
known now unto the king, that if this city be builded, and 
the walls set up again, then will they not pay toll, tribute, 
and custom, and so thou shalt endamage the revenue of the 
kings ;" Ezra iv. 13. Notwithstanding which, though tributary, 
they enjoyed their own religion, and were governed by their 
own laws ; and their governors, though they acted by virtue 
of a commission from the court of Persia, were, nevertheless, 
of their own nation; as Zerubbabel, Ezra, Nehemiah. 

2dly. This state of things, and this form of government, 
continued for upwards of two hundred years, until the time 
of Alexander the Great; who, having destroyed the Persian 
empire, and established the Grecian universal monarchy, the 
Jews became subject to him and his successors. Yet they 
were not properly conquered by him, as all the neighbouring 
nations were ; God having preserved them by a special and 
very extraordinary providence, which is thus related by Jo- 
sephus.* 

When Alexander was engaged in the siege of Tyre, he 
sent to Jaddua, the Jewish high-priest, for auxiliary troops, 
and necessaries for his army. Jaddua excused himself, al- 
leging his oath to Darius. Alexander, being greatly incensed, 
resolved to take a severe revenge. As soon, therefore, as he 
had made himself master of Tyre, and of Gaza, he marched 
against Jerusalem. Jaddua, in his pontifical robes, accom- 
panied by the other priests in their proper habits, went out, 
by divine direction, in solemn procession to meet Alexander. 
As soon as the king saw him, he hastened toward him, and 
bowed down to him with a religious veneration of that sacred 
name which was inscribed on the golden fillet round his tiara. 

* Antiq. lib. xi. cap. viii. sect. iii. — v. edit. Haverc. 



48 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



While all stood amazed at this extraordinary behaviour, Par- 
menio alone ventured to inquire of him, why he, who was 
adored by all, should himself pay such devotion to the Jewish 
high-priest. He replied, he did not pay it to the high-priest, 
but to the God whose priest he was ; for that when he was at 
Dio in Macedonia, and was deliberating how he should carry 
on the war against the Persians, this very person, in the very 
habit he now wore, appeared to him in a dream, and encou- 
raged him to pass over into Asia; assuring him, that God 
would give him the Persian empire. Having said this, Alex- 
ander gave his hand to Jaddua, and entered Jerusalem with 
him in a very friendly manner, and under his direction offered 
sacrifices to God in the temple. Here Jaddua showed him 
the prophecy of Daniel, which predicted the overthrow of the 
Persian empire by a Grecian king. At which he was so 
pleased, that he ordered the Jews to request whatever was 
agreeable to them. Upon this Jaddua petitioned, that they 
might enjoy their own laws and religion, and be excused from 
paying tribute every seventh year, because in that year they 
neither sowed nor reaped. All which he freely granted. 

After the death of Alexander, the Jews became subject 
and tributary to the kings of Egypt, or Syria ; as by various 
turns of providence, one or the other extended their dominion 
and power into those parts. The former were called Lagii, 
or Lagides, from Lagus, the father of Ptolemy the First; the 
latter, Seleucii, or Seleucides, from Seleucus Nicanor, king of 
Syria. 

The Jews, at length, were miserably persecuted and dis- 
tressed by Antiochus Epiphanes, the eighth of the Seleucian 
kings, about one hundred and seventy years before Christ. 
He is generally supposed to be that " vile person," of whom 
Daniel prophesied under that appellation, chap. xi. 21, &c; 
and he actually proved altogether as profane and cruel as the 
prophet represents him ; for he laid siege to Jerusalem, and 
took it by storm, and in two days' time massacred forty thou- 
sand of its inhabitants, and sold as many more to the neigh- 
bouring nations for slaves. He impiously forced himself into 
the temple, and into the holy of holies ; he sacrificed a great 
sow upon the altar of burnt-offering, and caused broth to be 
made of some part of the flesh, and to be sprinkled all over 



CHAP. I.] 



THE MACCABEES. 



49 



the temple. He afterward plundered the sacred edifice of 
all its golden and silver vessels and utensils, to the value of 
eighteen hundred talents of gold ; and having made the like 
plunder in the city, he left it, after he had, to the further vex- 
ation of the Jews, appointed Philip, a Phrygian, to be their 
governor ; who was a man of a cruel and barbarous temper. 
Upon this, 

3dly. Their state and form of government was changed by 
the Maccabees. 

When Antiochus had issued out a decree, that all nations 
under his dominion should conform to his religion, and wor- 
ship the same gods, and in the same manner, that he did, 
which decree was levelled chiefly against the Jews, he sent 
commissioners to execute it in Judea. One of them, named 
Apelles, came to Modin, where dwelt Mattathias, a very 
honourable priest, and zealous for the law of his God ; he was 
the great-grandson of Asmona^us ; from whence it is probable 
the family had the name of Asmoneans ; though others derive 
that title from the Hebrew word D^Dii'n chashmarmim, which 
signifies magnates or proceres. This Mattathias, with his five 
sons, fell upon the king's commissioner, as he was endeavouring 
to persuade the people to sacrifice to idols, and slew him and 
all his attendants. After which he retired into the mountains ; 
whither many of the Jews following him, they formed an 
army, and stood upon their defence. Afterward, leaving 
their fastnesses, they went about the country, destroying the 
heathen altars and idolaters, and restoring the worship of God 
according to the law, wherever they came. Mattathias, who 
was aged, died the next year, and was succeeded in the com- 
mand of the army by his son Judas ; who took for the motto 
of his standard, 

mi camo-ka baelim Jehovah. — Exod. xv. 11. 

" Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods ?" This 
motto is said to have been written, not at length, but only by 
the first letter of each word ODD; as P. S. Q.R., forpopulus 
senat usque Romanus, was written on the Roman standard. 
These four initial letters are generally supposed to have formed 
the artificial word Maccabi ; from whence this Judas has been 

E 



50 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



commonly called Judas Maccabseus ; and those that sided 
with him, and fought under his standard, were termed Mac- 
cabees. This is the opinion of Buxtorf, Prideaux, and almost 
all the learned. But Dr. Kennicot doubts of this derivation, 
since in some ancient manuscripts the name is written with a 
p instead of a D. # But whatever was the original of the word 
Maccabaeus, it afterward became a general name for all such 
as suffered in the cause of the true religion, under the Egyp- 
tian or Syrian kings. Accordingly, it is applied by the an- 
cient Christian writers to some who died many years before 
Judas set up his standard .f 

The Jews enjoyed their liberty under a succession of the 
Asmonean princes, though not without frequent wars and con- 
fusions, for near a hundred years; till Aristobulus, endea- 
vouring to wrest the crown from his elder brother Hyrcanus, 
raised a civil war ; which gave the Romans an opportunity to 
conquer Judea, and to reduce it into the form, first of a tribu- 
tary kingdom, and afterward of a Roman province. This 
brings us to the last state of the Jews before their utter 
destruction as a nation. 

4thly. They were subject to the Romans, and governed 
by kings appointed by the Roman emperors; as by Herod, 
and afterward by his son Archelaus, and then by a succession 
of Roman prefects, till the period of their state and polity, 
when the " sceptre entirely departed from Judah, and the 
lawgiver from between his feet," according to Jacob's cele- 

* See his second Dissert, on the state of the printed Hebrew Text, 
p. 535. 

f If the common derivation of the name Maccabees, be the true one, it 
was probably the original of artificial names, made of initial letters ; which 
have since been much used both by Jews and Christians. Thus, among 
the Jews, Rambam signifies Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon ; and Ralbag stands 
for Rabbi Levi Bert Gerson. We have likewise modern instances of the 
same sort of devices in our own country. About the year 1640 there were 
several treatises published against Diocesan Episcopacy under the name 
Smectymnuus, which was made of the initial letters of the names of five 
divines, who were the authors of those pieces—Stephen Marshal, Edmund 
Calamy, Thomas Young, Matthew Newcomen, and William Spurstow. 
The word Cabal is of the same kind, being made of the initial letters of the 
names of five lords in Charles the Second's reign, who caballed together, 
as we may now express it, to make the king absolute ; Clifford, Arlington, 
Buckingham, Anthony Ashley Cooper, and Lauderdale. 



CHAP. I.] 



Jacob's prophecy. 



61 



brated prophecy, which Godwin speaks of at the end of his 
first chapter. But as his account of it, and of the contro- 
versies concerning its meaning and accomplishment, is very 
imperfect, I shall here give a more full and complete one. 

Concerning Jacob's Prophecy. 

" The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver 
from between his feet, until Shiloh come, and unto him shall 
the gathering of the people be;" Gen. xlix. 10. 

And here, 

1st. I will consider the literal meaning of the words : And, 
2dly. Their prophetic import. 

1st. As to the literal meaning of those words, concerning 
which any doubt has been made, they are these four, tonitf 
shebhet, the sceptre ; ppnD mechokek, the lawgiver ; vbxi raglaiv, 
his feet; and nSitf Shiloh. 

The first word is \D2W shebhet, which we translate the sceptre ; 
for which rendering we have the united authority of the three 
Targums, namely, Onkelos, Jonathan, and the Jerusalem ; be- 
sides a great many of the modern rabbies. But others under- 
stand by it a tribe, as the same word sometimes signifies; par- 
ticularly in the sixteenth and twenty-eighth verses of this very 
chapter in which the prophecy we are now considering is 
recorded, and in some other places. And so they make the 
meaning of the first clause to be, " Judah shall not cease from 
being a tribe." Others again (chiefly of the modern Jews), 
understand by shebhet, the rod of correction or affliction, 
as the word sometimes imports: Job ix. 34; 2 Sam. vii. 14; 
Lam. iii. 1. Accordingly, they make this clause to signify, 
Judah shall not cease from being an afflicted people. But the 
peace and prosperity which Judah and all Israel have some- 
times enjoyed, particularly during the reigns of David and 
Solomon, are a sufficient objection against adopting that sense 
in this place. The truth is, W2W shebhet, from tD3i# shabhat, pro- 
duxit, to produce, primarily signifies a rod or wand, shooting 
from the root of a tree ; and, in a metaphorical sense, it denotes 
correction, of which a rod is often the instrument ; a tribe, 
which springs out of a common stock; a sceptre, and several 
other things. The meaning of it, therefore, in any particular 
place, must be determined by the context, and by the subject 
there spoken of. Now, as the context immediately preceding 

e2 



52 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



this famous prophecy foretells the dominion of Judah, not only 
over his enemies, but over his brethren, ver. 8, 9, nothing can 
be so naturally understood by D3t^ shebhet, in this clause, as a 
sceptre; and so it predicts the continuance and duration of 
that power and authority which was just before promised. In 
this sense the same phrase is used, nor is it capable of any 
other, when it is said, " The sceptre of Egypt shall depart 
away;" Zech. x. 11. 

The next word to be explained is ppnD mechokek, from ppn 
chakak, scripsit, statuit, mandavit, to ordain, command ; which 
is therefore very properly rendered a lawgiver. However, it 
seems to be a word of a lower signification than shebhet, 
which denotes royal authority ; as, " he that holdeth the 
sceptre," means the king ; Amos i. 5. Accordingly, the D*ppriD 
mechokekim, mentioned in the book of Judges, are the chief 
men, or magistrates, of the tribes of Israel, Judges v. 9. 14; 
who, though they were governors, as we render the word, yet 
were not vested with royal and supreme authority. 

The next word is )**bxi raglaiv, his feet ; of the literal mean- 
ing of which there is no doubt, unless we admit the correction 
of Ludolphus, who for vby\ raglaiv would read diglaiv, 
his banner, agreeably to the Samaritan copy. But there is 
no sufficient reason to admit this correction, contrary to the 
Targums, and most of the ancient versions. The phrase, there- 
fore, T^-Ti ) S 3D mibbein raglaiv, either signifies, as Waginseil 
renders it, even "to the last end of his state;" just as, "the 
people at the feet," an expression used in some places (Exod. 
xi. 8; 2 Kings iii. 9), denotes those that follow, or bring up 
the rear; or the word |>3D mibbein seems to determine )sbr\ 
raglaiv to the sense that is more commonly received, namely, 
from thy seed or posterity, referring to the situation of the 
parts of generation. 

4thly. But the greatest controversy of all is about the mean- 
ing of the word nSttf Shiloh, which our translators have not 
ventured to render by an English word, but have retained the 
original. As it is an airaZ, Xe yo^vov, and nothing in the context 
will certainly determine from what root it is derived, interpreters 
are much divided about its signification. Le Clerc is for deducing 
it from the Chaldee word rhv) shelah, cessavit, to cease, and so 
makes it to signify the end . Accordingly he represents the sense 
of this prophecy to be, " that from the time the sceptre came 



CHAP. I.] 



Jacob's prophecy. 



53 



into the tribe of Judah, it will continue in it, till that tribe be 
at an end." But this opinion has been confuted by Monsieur 
Saurin.* The translators of the Arabic and Syriac versions 
seem to have read )b'& shelo, illius, his, or to him, and so render 
it, " whose it is," that is, the kingdom. And not much differ- 
ent is the Septuagint version, which renders nbw Shiloh, ra 
anoKUfieva avno, donee veniant qua reposita sunt ei, or, ac- 
cording to other copies, w a-n-wKurm, he for whom it is re- 
served. Others derive it from bv& shil, which they will have 
to signify a son, because T\>bw shileiah signifies something that 
belongs to the birth. But I take the most probable opinion 
to be, either that Shiloh comes from ttbw shilach, misit, to 
send, writing n for n, and so it signifies him that is sent, or 
whom God would send ; under which character our Saviour 
is often spoken of in the New Testament (and this is the 
opinion of Jerome and Grotius) ; or else it comes from nbw 
shalah, tranquillus est, quievit, and so it signifies peaceable, 
or a peace-maker ; answerable to that name of the Messiah, 
D)bw ~)W sar shalom, the prince of peace ; Isa. ix. 6. But let 
the original of the word rtyty Shiloh be what it will, it is al- 
most universally acknowledged to mean the Messiah ; in par- 
ticular, by all the Targums, as well as by many other ancient 
and modern Jews, as well as Christians. Having thus consi- 
dered the literal meaning of the words of this prophecy, we are, 

2dly. To inquire into its prophetical import, and the time 
of its accomplishment. 

According to the learned Joseph Mede, in his discourse on 
this prophecy, the sceptre, and the lawgiver, are pretty much 
synonymous terms, importing any power or majesty of govern- 
ment, under what form or name soever ; and the meaning of 
the sceptre not departing from Judah is, not that it should 
not cease from having a king, or being a kingdom ; but that it 
should not cease from being a state or body politic, or from 
having a power of government and jurisdiction within itself, 
till the Messiah came. Accordingly, it is observable, that 
Judah, with the little appendage of Benjamin, was the only 
tribe in which the sceptre did, in this sense, continue to the 
end of the Jewish polity. For it entirely departed from the 
other ten tribes at the Assyrian captivity. 



* See his Disc. Histor. disc. xli. 



54 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



As for the last clause of the prophecy, " to him shall the 
gathering of the people be/' Mr. Mede understands it of 
another event, which should also be accomplished before the 
sceptre departed from Judah, namely, the conversion of the 
Gentiles to the Christian faith. When, therefore, our Saviour 
foretells the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish state, he 
adds, " This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all 
the world, for a witness to all nations, and then shall the end 
come;" Matt. xxiv. 14. But Dr. Patrick inclines to Wa- 
ginseil's sense ; which is, that there should be either king or 
governor among the Jews till the coming of Christ ; for the 
Vau before ppnD mechokek may as well be understood disjunc- 
tively as copulatively : in which case, " the sceptre" may re- 
fer to the royal government in the house of David ; and the 
" lawgiver" (which, we observed before, is a word of a lower 
signification), to the form of government under Zerubbabel, 
the Maccabees, &c, till Judea was made'a Roman province. 
For though some of these governors were not of the tribe of 
Judah ; the Maccabees, for instance, who were priests of the 
tribe of Levi ; nevertheless the tribe of Judah was the centre 
of the state, or the seat of government. And he farther ob- 
serves, that these two forms of government, signified by the 
sceptre and the lawgiver, nearly divided the whole time, from 
the beginning to the end of Judah 's authority, into two equal 
parts, there being a little more than five centuries under 
each. However, presently after our Saviour's birth, the Jews 
lost even their D s ppntt mechokekim, or governors, as they had 
before lost the sceptre ; and the administration of public af- 
fairs was no longer in their own hands.* 

* Mede's Diatribae, disc. viii. ; Kidder's Demonst. of the Messiah, part iii. 
chap. vii. ; Saurin's Discours. Histor. disc. xli. ; Patrick in loc. ; Prideaux's 
Connect, sub. A. C. 8. vol. iv. p. 932, edit. x. ; Bishop Sherlock's third dis- 
sert, in his Disc, on Prophecy ; Bishop of Bristol (Newton) on the Prophe- 
cies, vol. i. p. 94, &c. An account of the various interpretations, both of 
the Jews and Christians, may be found, not only in these authors, but in 
Le Clerc in loc, and especially in Martin. Helvic. de vaticin. Jacobi, apud 
Critic. Sacr. torn. viii. ; Huet. Demonst. Evang. prop. ix. cap. iv. ; Christoph. 
Cartwright. electa Targumico Rabbin, in Gen. ; and Jacobi Altingii Schilo, 
seu de Patriarchs Jacobi vaticinio. 

On the general subject of the preceding chapter, see Spencer de Theo- 
cratia Judaica; apud Leges Hebraeor. ; Witsius de Theocrat. Israelitica; 
and especially Mr. Lowman's Civil Government of the Hebrews. 



CHAPTER II. 



OF THE PUBLICANS. 

Before we treat of the publicans, or tax-gatherers, it will 
be proper to premise something concerning the Jewish taxes. 

Of the Taxes. 

It was observed, in a former lecture, that as the law of 
Moses was the only codex juris, or body of law, enacted by 
God* the king of Israel, for the government both of church 
and state ; and as the priests were appointed to dispense it, 
they are properly to be considered as ministers of state, as 
well as of religion ; and therefore the tithes, and the portion 
of sacrifices, which the law assigned for their maintenance, 
were in the nature of taxes, payable for the support of the 
government. Besides these, we read of no other stated taxes 
appointed by the law ; except a poll-tax of half a shekel, 
which, when they were numbered in the wilderness, was levied 
upon every man from twenty years old and upwards ; and it 
is said to be designed for " a ransom, or atonement, for his 
soul," and to be " appointed for the service of the tabernacle 
of the congregation;" Exod. xxx. 12 — 16. It is not provided 
that this tax should be paid annually ; but being intended for 
the ransom of their souls, or as an act of homage and ac- 
knowledgment to God of their being his redeemed people, 
there was equal reason, in the opinion of the Jewish doctors, 
for its constant subsistence, as for its original appointment ; 
and being devoted to the service of the tabernacle of the con- 
gregation, by which they understand their daily sacrifice and 
offerings, salt for the sacrifices, wood for the altar of burnt- 
offering, incense, shew-bread, &c, which were constant na- 
tional charges ; from hence they infer, that the tax to support 



56 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



them must be national, and annual, or stated. But Grotius 
is of opinion, that this poll-tax, at least in the former ages of 
the Hebrew commonwealth, was not annual ; but only levied 
on peculiar exigencies ; as when the free-will offerings, de- 
dicated by the princes and people to maintain the house of 
the Lord, were not sufficient (for we read of large donations 
for that purpose in David's time, which seem to render the 
poll-tax needless, 1 Chron. xxvi. 26, 27); or, when some ex- 
traordinary expense, about the sanctuary and its service, oc- 
curred ; as for repairing the temple in the reign of king 
Joash ; who " gathered the priests and the Levites, and com- 
manded them to collect from all Israel money to repair the 
house of the Lord from year to year;" and, on account of 
their dilatoriness, the order being repeated, " proclamation 
was made through Judah and Jerusalem to bring in the collec- 
tion that Moses, the servant of God, laid upon Israel in the 
wilderness ;" 2 Chron. xxiv. 5, 6. 9. Now one can hardly 
suppose this tax would have been levied by proclamation*un- 
less it had been occasional, and not stated and annual. In 
Nehemiah's time it was also levied by a new ordinance ; for 
which there would have been no occasion, if the law of Moses 
had made it perpetual.* On account of the people's poverty, 
it was, at this time, lowered from one-half to one-third of a 
shekel; Nehem. x. 32, 33. This third of a shekel Aben-ezra 
will have to be an additional voluntary contribution, over and 
above the annual tax of the half shekel. But, considering the 
low circumstances the Jews were now in, and how they had 
been impoverished by the late captivity, that is not probable .f 
If we suppose this poll-tax was not, by divine appointment, 
stated and annual, but only levied on public exigencies, we 
may, perhaps, be able to account for David's numbering the 
people being represented as so heinous a sin, 2 Sam. xxiv. ; 
1 Chron. xxi. ; for which different interpreters have given very 
different reasons. 

The common opinion is, that his sin consisted in his pride 
and vanity, which made him desirous of knowing how populous 
and powerful his country was. Ralbag, who is followed by 
Abarbanel, conceives it lay in making flesh his arm, and con- 

* See Lowman's Civil Govern, of the Hebr. p. 96, et seq. 
f See Aben-ezra in loc, and Grotius on Matt. xvii. 24. 



CHAP. II.] 



HEBREW TAXES. 



57 



fiding in the multitude of his subjects. Some make it consist 
in infidelity, and mistrust of God's promise to Abraham, that 
he would " increase his seed like the stars of heaven, which 
no man should be able to number Gen. xv. 5. 

However, if Grotius be right about the poll-tax, it may in- 
cline one to adopt Dr. Lightfoot's opinion, that " God gave up 
David to a covetous thought to number the people, that he 
might lay a tax upon every poll. " # And if so, we cannot wonder 
his sin is represented as so heinous : the guilt was very compli- 
cated, being, besides avarice, a contradiction to the law of God, 
in levying the tax when there was no occasion for it, and an 
act of tyranny and oppression on the people. But to return. 

However it was in former times, this tax certainly became 
annual and stated in the later ages of the Jewish common- 
wealth; having, perhaps, been made so by the Asmonean 
princes ; who being high-priests, as well as possessed of the 
sovereign civil authority, would very likely be for increasing 
the ecclesiastical revenues, by converting that occasional tax 
into a stated one. We have the testimony of Josephus, that 
this tax was paid annually ; for he saith, Vespasian commanded 
every Jew to pay the annual tribute of two drachmas to the 
capitol, which had been formerly paid to the temple at Jeru- 
salem 4* Now bishop Cumberland informs us, that the attic 
drachm answered to the fourth part of the Jewish shekel, which 
weighed half an ounce avoirdupois; J two drachms, therefore, 
answered to the half shekel, being in value of our money a 
little more than one shilling and two-pence. Mr. Selden§ 
thinks, that this was the tax Cicero refers to, when, in his 
oration pro Flacco, he speaks of " gold, sent every year in 
the name of the Jews out of Italy, and all the provinces, to 
Jerusalem. "|| This I take to be the tribute which was demanded 
of Christ, Matt. xvii. 24; not only because it is called 
SiSjoax/xa, which signifieth two drachms, and so answereth 

* Harmony of the Old Test, sub Anno Mund. 2988, Davidis, 39. 

f De Bell. Jud. lib. vii. cap. vi. sect. vi. edit. Haverc; see also Dion 
Cassius, lib. lxvi. cap. vii. p. 1082, edit. Reimari, 1752. 

\ See his Essay on Jewish Weights and Measures, chap. iv. 

§ De Jure Nat. etGent. lib. vi. cap. xviii. apud Opera, vol. i. tom.i. p. 691, 
edit. Londini, 1726. 

|| Ciceronis Oper. vol. v. sect, xxvii. p. 345, edit. Olivet. Genev. 1758. 



58 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



to the Jewish half shekel ; but because the reason which he 
allegeth, why he might have excused himself from paying it, 
ver 25, 26, shows it was a tribute paid, not to the Roman 
emperor, as Salmasius thinks, # but to God, for the service of 
his temple : so that Christ, being the Son of God, might have 
pleaded an exemption. 

It may possibly be objected, that if this tribute was a stated 
annual tax, payable by every Jew, how came the collectors to 
inquire of Peter, " Doth not your Master pay tribute?" To 
this it is replied, 

1st. They might be in doubt, whether he would choose to 
pay it at Capernaum, where at that time he was, which, very 
likely, they could not have obliged him to do ; or at his own 
town of Nazareth, or at Jerusalem. Or, 

2dly. The meaning of the question may be, whether he 
would pay it then, on the spot. For the doctors tells us, that, 
on the first day of the month Adar, notice was given, through- 
out all the country, for men to make this payment; and offi- 
cers were appointed to sit in every city of Judea to receive 
it; yet nobody was obliged to pay it immediately ; but if they 
did not pay it in a certain prefixed time afterward, they w T ere 
then compelled. 

These taxes, namely, the tithes, the sacrificial offerings, 
and the poll-tax of the half shekel (w T hether annual or occa- 
sional), are all the taxes expressly levied by the Mosaic law T . 
We read, indeed, of an extraordinary contribution for the 
building of the tabernacle, which God ordered Moses to re- 
commend to the people, Exod. xxv. 2 ; and which they made 
so liberally, that their lawgiver thought proper to restrain 
them by proclamation; Exod. xxxvi. 3 — 7. However, this 
was not in the nature of a tax, but a free gift, every one 
giving as he pleased. 

As for the expenses of war, in which the Israelites were 
often engaged, it is to be considered, that they held their 
estates by military tenure ; for it appeareth from the exemp- 
tions allowed some persons on particular occasions, from at- 
tending military service, Deut. xx. 5, &c, that all others were 
bound to attend.f So that the Israelitish troops were a militia, 

* Salmasii ad Johannem Miltonum responsio, p. 272. 

f See Lowman's Civil Government of the Hebrews, chap. iv. p. 52. 



CHAP. II.] 



HEBREW TAXES. 



59 



maintained at their own expense; which was the reason of 
Jesse's sending provisions to his sons in Saul's army; 1 Sam. 
xvii. 17, 18. There was ordinarily, therefore, no need of taxes 
to defray the charges of war. 

When the Israelites came to be governed by kings, who, 
like other monarchs, affected pomp and magnificence, no 
doubt, some taxes were necessary to defray that extraordinary 
expense, and to support the dignity of the crown : and though 
these taxes were not properly of God's appointment, anymore 
than the regal government itself, yet the Jews look upon this 
law in the book of Deuteronomy, " Neither shall the king 
greatly multiply to himself silver and gold," Deut. xvii. 17, as 
implying a permission to levy necessary taxes on the people; 
only God, foreseeing they would in time change the form of 
government which he had appointed into a monarchy, like 
that of other nations, restrains their kings by this prohibition 
from levying expensive taxes on the subject. 

It should seem, Solomon did not sufficiently regard this re- 
straint; for he multiplied to himself, not only "horses and 
wives," contrary to the law, ver. 16, 17, but also " silver and 
gold;" so that the people groaned under the burden of taxes; 
which proved the immediate occasion of the revolt of the ten 
tribes from his son and successor Rehoboam; 1 Kings xii. 4. 
How these taxes were levied does not appear in the scripture 
history. 

After the captivity, the Jews were tributary to the Persians, 
as is plain from the letter which their enemies wrote to Artax- 
erxes, to prevent the rebuilding of Jerusalem; in which they 
inform him, that if the city be built and fortified, then the 
Jews "will not pay toll, tribute, and custom;" Ezra iv. 13. 
We have no account how the toll, tribute, and custom, here 
mentioned, were levied. By the first of these words, Grotius 
understands a poll-tax; by the second, a duty upon commo- 
dities and merchandise; and by the third, a tax upon their 
land : but Wltsius, a land-tax, or rather a tax on property in 
general, by the first; a poll-tax, by the second; and a toll 
collected on the road from merchants, who travelled with their 
goods from place to place, by the third . # However that be, it 

* Miscell. torn. ii. exercitat. xi. sect. xxi. p. 289. 



60 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



is probable the whole tribute to the Persian monarch was paid 
by the chief governor of Judea, out of the taxes which he 
levied on the subject. 

When Pompey conquered Judea, and put an end to the 
Asmonean race of kings (which Godwin says was about sixty 
years before Christ), the Jews became tributary to the Ro- 
mans. But he is mistaken in supposing, as he seems to have 
done, that the publicans, so often mentioned in the New 
Testament, subsisted among them immediately from that con- 
quest : for publicans were tax-gatherers in the Roman pro- 
vinces. Now Judea was not reduced into the form of a pro- 
vince till the reign of Augustus, and some years after our 
Saviour's birth. Till then it was only a dependent kingdom, 
governed by its own kings; though not, as formerly, natives 
and chosen by the Jews, but appointed by the Roman emperors. 
Herod, who succeeded Antigonus, the last of the Asmonean 
race, was not a Jew, but an Idumean. # 

Archelaus, Herod's son and successor, having committed 
many flagrant acts of mal-administration and tyranny, both 
the Jews and Samaritans sent ambassadors, to accuse him 
before Augustus. Upon which he was summoned to Rome, 
where not being able to clear himself of the crimes charged 
upon him, which were fully proved, he was deposed from his 
principality, after he had reigned ten years. This happened 
Anno Dom. 8, or in the 12th year of our Saviour's age.f 

Augustus took this opportunity to reduce Judea into the 
form of a Roman province, and sent Publius Sulpitius Quiri- 
nius, afterward made president of Syria (the same who, ac- 
cording to the Greek way of writing his name, is called Cyre- 
nius by St. Luke, chap. ii. 2), to seize the country over which 
Archelaus had reigned ; and with him Coponius, a Roman of 

* This hath made some suppose, that the sceptre departed from Judah, 
according to Jacob's prophecy, upon the accession of Herod. But that 
must be a mistake; since he acceded above thirty years before Shiloh, or 
the Messiah, came. The truth is, the sceptre was still amoDgst them, though 
he who swayed it was not a native. 

t Dionysius Exiguus, a Roman abbot, who lived in the sixth century, and 
was the author of the Christian Era, fixed it, by mistake, four years after 
the birth of Christ. See Dupin's History of Ecclesiastical Writers, cent. vi. 
p. 42 ; Dr. Cave's Historia Literaria, sub anno 533, p. 333, edit. Genev. 
1720 ; et Usserii Aimales, setat. mundi vii. ab init. p. 568, edit. Genev. 1722. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE CENSUS. 



61 



the equestrian order, to take upon him the government, under 
the title of procurator of Judea, yet in subordination to the 
president of Syria. It should seem the emperor had formed 
this design several years before, when he ordered the public 
census, or enrolment, of the subjects of the empire to extend 
to Judea ; which occasioned the Virgin Mary's being at Beth- 
lehem at the time of her delivery, ver. 1 — 5. But the reduc- 
tion of Jiidea to the form of a province was not till twelve 
years after ; and then taxes were first paid by its inhabitants 
immediately to the Roman state. For though the people of 
dependent kingdoms paid them to their own princes, and 
whatever the Romans received was from them, yet those of 
the provinces paid them directly to the Roman government, 
or to the officers which the senate appointed to collect and 
receive them. 

The subject we have been upon naturally leads me to con- 
sider a difficulty, which hath occasioned the learned not a 
little trouble — the reconcilino; St. Luke's account of the en- 
rolment, or census of the land of Judea, with Josephus. 

Concerning the Census in the time of Augustus. 

According to the Jewish historian, Josephus, Cyrenius was 
not governor of Syria till ten or twelve years after our Sa- 
viour's birth, after Archelaus was deposed, and the country 
brought under a Roman procurator ;* whereas St. Luke says, 
avry f) airoypafyy Trpwry eyevero riye/iiovtvovTog rr\q *2ivpiag Kvpri- 
viov ; which we render, " And this taxing was first made when 
Cyrenius was governor of Syria," Luke ii. 2; yet this, ac- 
cording to him, was before the death of Herod, the father and 
predecessor of Archelaus, and in the same year when Christ 
was born. 

Now as, on the one hand, it cannot be supposed, that a 
writer so accurate as Luke (were he considered only as a 
common historian) should make so gross a mistake as to con- 
found the enrolment in the reign of Herod with that taxation 
under Cyrenius, which happened many years after; so, on 
the other hand, it is hard to conceive that Josephus should be 

* Antiq. lib. xvii. cap. xiii. sect. ii. v.; et lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. i. ed. Haverc. 



62 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK t. 



mistaken in an affair of so public a nature, so important to 
his own nation, and so recent when he wrote his history. 
To remove this difficulty, 

1st. Some have supposed a corruption of the original text 
in Luke ; and that, instead of Cyrenius, it ought to be read 
Saturninus, who, according to Josephus, was prefect of Syria 
within a year or two before Herod's death. 

2dly. Others have thought it probable, that the original name 
in St. Luke was Quintilius ; since Quintilius Varus succeeded 
Saturninus, and was in the province of Syria when Herod died. 

But all the Greek manuscripts remonstrate against both 
these solutions. Therefore, 

3dly. Mr. Whiston and Dr. Prideaux suppose that the 
words, " In those days there went out a decree from Caesar 
Augustus, that all the world (or, as oiKovfxevn may be rendered, 
the whole land) should be taxed," ver. 1, refer to the time of 
making the census ; and the subsequent words, "This taxing 
was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria," ver. 2, 
to the time of levying the tax. Dr. Prideaux imagines this 
will answer all objections. # 

4thly. Herwaert, and after him Dr. Whitby, render the 
text in this manner, " And this taxing was first made before 
that made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.f 

5thly. Dr. Lardner has given the easiest and best solution 
of this difficulty, rendering the words thus : " This was the 
first assessment of Cyrenius, governor of Syria." Which ver- 
sion he hath supported by substantial criticism ; and likewise 
rendered it highly probable, that Cyrenius (afterward governor 
of Syria, and at the time St. Luke wrote, well known by that 
title) was employed in making the first enrolment of the in- 
habitants of Judea in the reign of Herod .J 

Of the Publicans. 
Judea being now added to the provinces of the Roman 

* Whiston's short View of the Harmony of the Evangelists, prop, xi., and 
Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book ix. sub anno 5 before the Christian era, 
vol. iv. p. 917—922, edit. 10. 

f Herwaert's Nova et Vera Chronologia, p. 189, and Whitby in loc. 

X See Credibility of the Gospel History, part i. vol. ii. book ii. ch. i= 



CHAP. II.] 



THE PUBLICANS. 



G3 



empire, and the taxes paid by the Jews directly to the em- 
peror, the publicans were the officers appointed to collect 
them. 

Now the ordinary taxes which the Romans levied in the 
provinces, were of three sorts : 

1st. Customs upon goods imported and exported ; which 
tribute was therefore called portorium, from portus, a haven. 

2dly. A tax upon cattle fed in certain pastures belonging 
to the Roman state, the number of which being kept in writ- 
ing, this tribute was called script ura. 

3dly. A tax upon corn, of which the government demanded 
a tenth part. This tribute was called decuma. 

We read of fyopog and re\og, translated " tribute and cus- 
tom;" Romans xiii. 7. Concerning the precise and distinct 
meaning of these words, the critics are much divided. Gro- 
tius makes <f>opog to signify a tax upon lands and persons ; and 
TtXoc, custom upon goods and merchandise. Lipsius, by reXog 
understands a tax upon a real estate ; by Qopog, a tax upon 
moveables and persons. Leigh*' supposes (popog to mean 
duties upon goods ; reXog, a capitation or poll-tax. According 
to Beza, Qopog signifies a capitation or poll-tax, and reXog in- 
cludes all other taxes and duties. Other critics have given 
still different accounts. So that, in the midst of such great 
uncertainty, we must be content with this general observation, 
that these words together include all taxes and duties, though 
we are unable to ascertain the precise meaning of either of 
them, or the difference betwixt them. It being highly pro- 
bable, that the public taxes varied from one age to another, I 
suspect, that in different ages these words were applied to 
different taxes and duties, which occasions an uncertainty 
about the precise idea to be affixed to them. Perhaps rcXoc 
was the more general name, or included the larger number of 
taxes, at least among the Greeks ; which seems probable from 
the collectors, in their language, being called rsAwvat ; whereas 
in the Latin they are styled publicaTii, as being collectors of 
the public taxes, or revenue of the state. 

These publicans are distinguished by Sigonius into three 
sorts or degrees, the farmers of the revenue, their partners, 



* See his Critica Sacra, in verb. 



64 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



and their securities,* in which he follows Polybius.f These 
are called the mancipes, socii, and prides; who were all 
under the qu&stores czrarii, that presided over the finances at 
Rome, The mancipes farmed the revenue of large districts, 
or provinces, had the oversight of the inferior publicans, re- 
ceived their accounts and collections, and transmitted them to 
the quastores azrarii. They often let out their provinces in 
smaller parcels to the socii ;% so called, because they were 
admitted to a share in the contract, perhaps for the sake of 
more easily raising the purchase-money ; at least to assist in 
collecting the tribute. Both the mancipes and socii are there- 
fore properly styled teXwcu, from rcXoc, tributum, and wvco/icu, 
emo. They were obliged to procure prades, or sureties, § 
who gave security to the government for the fulfilment of the 
contract. || The distribution of Sigonius, therefore, or rather 
of Polybius, is not quite exact, since there were properly but 
two sorts of publicans, the mancipes and the socii. 

The former are, probably, those whom the Greeks call 
apxiT£\b)vai ; of which sort was Zaccheus ; Luke xix. 2. As 
they were much superior to the common publicans in dignity, 
being mostly of the equestrian order, so they were generally 
in their moral character. They are mentioned with great re- 
spect and honour by Cicero : " Flos," saith he, " equitum 
Romanorum, omamentum civitatis, firmamentum reipublicse, 

* " Alii conducebant, alii cum his societatem coibant, alii pro his bona 
fortunasque reipublicee obligabant." Sigon. de Antiq. Jure Civium Roma- 
norum, lib. ii. cap. iv. 

4* 'Ot fxev yap ayopagovai Tsrapa twv TifxriTccv avroi ras eKdocreis' ot Se koivwvovcTi 
tovtow' ot Be eyyvwvr at ras eyopaxoras' ot Se rav ovcrias SiBeao'iv trept roxrray ets to 
5r}/j.o(riou. " Alii enim a censoribus iocationes per se emunt ; alii cum his 
societatem habent ; alii pro redemptoribus fidem suam interponunt ; alii 
horum nomine bona sua in publicum addicunt." Polyb. Hist. lib. vi. torn, 
i. p. 646, edit. Gronov. Amstel. 1670. 

J We meet frequently in Cicero with the Socii, and the Publicanorum 
Societates: Orat. pro Domo sua, vol. v. sect, xxviii. p. 472, ed. Olivet.; and 
with the Principes, or Magistri Societatum, who were the Mancipes, Orat. 
pro Plane, vol. v. sect. ix. p. 545, et sect. 13, p. 548, et Epist. Famil. lib. 
xiii. epist. ix. ; and the Digests mention the Socii vectigalium, lib. xxxix. 
tit. iv. leg. ix. sect. iv. 

§ Called Fidejussores in the Digests, ubi supra, leg. ix. ab init. 

|| Pras signifies a surety for money, as vas does a surety in criminal 
matters. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE PUBLICANS. 



65 



publicanorum ordine continetur."* He likewise calls them 
" ordinem mihi commendatissimum."f But as for the common 
publicans, the collectors or receivers, as many of the socii 
were, they are spoken of with great contempt, by heathens as 
well as Jews ; and particularly by Theocritus, who said, that 
" among the beasts of the wilderness, bears and lions are the 
most cruel ; among the beasts of the city, the publican and 
parasite. "J The reason of the general hatred to them was, 
doubtless, their rapine and extortion. For, having a share in 
the farm of the tribute, at a certain rate, they were apt to 
oppress the people with illegal exactions, to raise as large a 
fortune as they could for themselves. Besides, publicans 
were particularly odious to the Jews, who looked upon them 
to be the instruments of their subjection to the Roman em- 
perors, to which they generally held it sinful for them to sub- 
mit. For among the laws in Deuteronomy concerning the 
kings, there is in particular the following : " One from among 
thy brethren shalt thou set over thee ; thou may est not set a 
stranger over thee, who is not thy brother;" chap. xvii. 15. 
Now paying tribute to the Roman emperor they looked upon 
to be a virtual acknowledgment of his sovereignty. This, 
therefore, was a heavy grievance, and created an aversion to 
the collectors, as the instruments of illegal oppression, apart 
from all consideration of their rapacious practices. Accord- 
ingly, in the New Testament, we find them joined with har- 
lots and heathens, and persons of the most profligate and in- 
famous characters ; and it was intended for a severe reproach 
of our Lord Jesus Christ, when he was said to be <( a friend of 
publicans and sinners ;" Luke vii. 34. Hence that ensnaring 
question was put to him, with a design " to entangle him in 
his talk," Matt. xxii. 15. 17, " Is it lawful to give tribute to 
Csesar 1" If he had denied it, it would have been judged an 
offence against the state ; and if he had affirmed it, it would 

* Orat. pro Plancio, apud Opera, vol. v. sect. ix. p. 544, edit. Olivet. 

f Epist. Tamil, lib. xiii. epist. x. apud Op. vol. vii. p. 442. Vid. etiam 
epist. ix. per totum, et Epist. ad Attic, lib. i. epist. xvii. vol. viii. p. 80. 

X Vid. Hammond on Matt. ix. 10. The twelfth law, under the fourth 
title, in the thirty-first book of the Digests, is prefaced with these remark- 
able words : " Quantse audaciae, quanta temeritatis sint publicanorum fac- 
tories, nemo est qui nesciat." 

F 



m 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 



probably have exposed him to the rage and resentment of the 
people. It was on pretence of freeing them from this tributary 
yoke, that Judas of Galilee, or (as Josephus calls him) Judas 
Gaulanites, excited an " insurrection in the days of the taxing, 
and drew away much people after him Acts v. 37. Of this 
Josephus gives a particular account,* and saith, that when 
the census was first extended to Judea by Cyrenius, after 
Archelaus had been deposed by Augustus, the Jews were 
greatly chagrined at it ; but at the persuasion of Joazer, the 
high-priest, they generally submitted. Yet, it seems, much 
against their wills ; for when this Judas excited the people to 
rebellion, and to assert their liberty, they heard him, saith the 
historian, "with incredible pleasure,'' and made an insurrec- 
tion on that account, under him as their leader. 

Tertullianf imagined, that the publicans, among the Jews, 
were all heathens ; which, not understanding Hebrew, he 
grounded on a spurious text in the Septuagint.J This opi- 
nion is confuted by the instances of Matthew and Zaccheus, 
who both appear to be Jews, by their names and their history. 
The latter is expressly said to be a son of Abraham ; and as 
for Matthew, we may be assured, that our Lord, who, at 
present, was sent to none but the lost sheep of the house of 
Israel, would not have made an apostle of a Gentile. How- 
ever, the Jews, who accepted the office of publicans, were, 
on that account, hated of their own nation equally with hea- 
thens, with w r hom they are sometimes ranked, Matt, xviii. 17; 
and, according to the rabbies, it was a maxim, " A religious 
man, who becomes a publican, is to be driven out of the so- 
ciety of religion. "§ 

* Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. i. edit. Haverc. 
f De Pudicitia, sect. ix. p. 561, C. edit. Rigalt. 

X Deut. xxiii. 18, in the Greek. The words are, owe es-cu re\eo-<popos avo 
^vyarepwu IcrparjA, nou ovk erai tzXktkoixcvos avo viau l<rpar]\. They were proba- 
bly at first a gloss in the margin, or inserted in the text of the Seventy from 
some other version ; and are strangely misunderstood by Tertullian, who 
supposes rete<r<popos to signify, in this place, a publican, or tax-gatherer, 
which it most commonly does ; but here it means a prostitute for hire, such 
as in the Pagan mysteries raised contributions by their lewdness. See Gro- 
tius and Le Clerc in loc, 

§ See Lightfoot, Horae Heb. on Matt, xviii. 17. 



CHAPTER III. 



ISRAELITES AND PROSELYTES. 

Godwin distinguishes the people of Israel into two sorts, 
Hebrews and Proselytes. We may properly advance a step 
higher, and divide the whole world, after the commonwealth 
of Israel had been formed, into Jews and Gentiles. 

The Jews, or Israelites, were those members of the He- 
brew republic who worshipped the one true God according to 
the Mosaic ritual; all others they called DH5 goim, Gentiles, 
and ummim, the people, meaning, of the world, Psalm ii. 
1. In the New Testament they are styled r EAArjv£c> Greeks; 
Rom. i. 16, and ii. 9, 10. When Greeks are opposed to bar- 
barians,* the term signifies the learned, as distinguished from 
the illiterate part of mankind ; the Greeks in those days being 
looked upon as a people of the most erudition, or at least their 
language being esteemed the most improved and polite. But 
when Greeks are opposed to Jews, they include the whole hea- 
then world, of which the Greeks were the most considerable. 
Some have imagined, that the triple distinction which St. Paul 
makes, Gal. iii. 28, " there is neither Jew nor Greek, there 
is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female," re- 
fers to a form of thanksgiving which the Jews are said to 
have repeated in their daily prayers ; wherein they gave thanks 
to God for these three things : that he had made them Jews, 
and not Gentiles; that he had made them free, and not 
bond-men, or slaves ; that he had made them men, and not 
women. Instead of the third article, the women thanked 
God that he had made them as it pleased him. If this 

* As by St. Paul, Rom. i. 14, and by heathen authors: auriKeirat yap tw 
'EWrjvi 6 Pap§apos, — "The barbarian is opposed to the Greek." Thucyd.lib. i. 
sect. iii. Schol. v.p. 3, edit. Huds.Oxon. 1696. Ai%a 8iaipovvras airav to rcov 
avSpwirwv t&Atj&os as 'EKtyvas nai &ap§apovs, — " dividing the whole world into 
Greeks and barbarians." Strab. lib. ii. p. 45, edit. Casaub. Paris, 1620. 

F2 



68 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK I . 

form was, indeed, as ancient as the time of the apostle, it 
may naturally be supposed that he referred to it in this pas- 
sage, where he is showing that the peculiar prerogatives and 
privileges which the Jews enjoyed under the Old Testament, 
were by the gospel equally extended to the Gentiles; and that 
all who believe in Christ, without regard to their nation, 
worldly condition, or sex, are admitted into his church, and 
made partakers of his salvation. 

We now come to consider the distinction of the members 
of the commonwealth of Israel, into Hebrews and Proselytes. 

1st. As to the Hebrews : The learned are divided concern- 
ing the derivation and meaning of this word, which so often 
occurs both in the Old and New Testament. We find it first 
applied to Abraham, Gen. xiv. 13; and in a multitude of 
places to his posterity, to distinguish them from all other peo- 
ple; particularly from the Egyptians, Gen.xliii. 32; and the 
Philistines, 1 Sam. iv. 9. 

The more common opinion concerning its meaning, main- 
tained by the Jewish rabbies, and espoused by BuxtorfT the 
son, # is, 

1st. That it is appellatio patron y mica, a family name, 
from Eber, who was the great grandson of Shem, and Abra- 
ham's great, great, great, great grandfather; that is, he was 
a lineal descendant from Eber in the seventh generation .f 

Two queries will naturally be started upon this opinion : 

1st. Why Abraham and his posterity should take their 
name from so remote a progenitor as Eber; — or if from a re- 
mote one, why not from Shem, the first father and founder of 
the family after Noah ? 

2dly. Why this appellation should be given to Abraham 
and his family, rather than to any other of Eber's posterity? 

In answer to the first query, the rabbies tell us, that Eber 
was a man of singular piety ; that the primitive religion and 
language were preserved by him and his family; and that 
Abraham and his posterity are called Hebrews, because they 
spoke the same language, and professed and practised the 
same religion, that Eber did. 

* See his Dissert, de Linguse Hebraicse Conservatione, apud Dissertat. 
Philolog. Theolog. p. 147, Basil. 1662. 

f See the genealogy of Abraham's family, Gen. xi. 10, &c. 



CHAP. III.] 



HEBREWS. 



69 



But this reason seems to have its principal foundation in the 
national pride of the Jews, who would have us believe, that 
their language was spoken in Paradise, and their ancestors 
peculiarly favoured of God above all other people, even long 
before the call of Abraham. But Le Clerc has rendered it 
highly probable, that the Hebrew was the language of the 
Canaanites, and that Abraham, whose original tongue was the 
language of the Chaldee (for he came out of Ur of the Chal- 
dees, Gen. xv. 7), learnt it, as Isaac and Jacob and their fami- 
lies did, by dwelling in the land of Canaan. # However that 
be, it remains to be proved, that the Hebrew language is the 
same which Eber spoke. What they say of his singular piety 
is gratis dictum; and their account of the true religion being- 
preserved in his family down to Abraham's time, by no means 
agrees w T ith Joshua's saying, that the ancestors of the Israel- 
ites, who in old time dwelt " on the other side of the flood, 
even Terah, the father of Abraham, served other gods 
Josh. xxiv. 2. 

The second query is, Why the name Hebrew should be 
given to Abraham and his family, rather than to any other of 
Eber's posterity ; for Eber had other sons and daughters, be- 
sides Peleg, his son in the line of Abraham ? Gen. xi. 17. 

The common reply is, because the blessings of the covenant 
of grace were limited to that line of Eber's posterity, which 
reached down to Abraham. On this account, as it is sup- 
posed, Shem is called " the father of the children of Eber ;" 
and not so much because he was their natural progenitor ; 
which he was, likewise, of many other families and nations. 
And as the posterity of Isaac and Jacob, and not that of Ish- 
mael and Esau, are called the children of Abraham, so the 
posterity of Eber are the children of Shem, kcit *£ox*fv. 

Still the idolatry of Abraham's nearer progenitors may be 
urged as an objection ; and it is reasonable to ask, whether 
the blessings of the covenant were continued to those fathers 
or ancestors of Abraham, who served other gods ? Indeed, 
that they were limited to Shem's posterity in the line of Eber, 
before the calling of Abraham, is gratis dictum. This opinion 
also of the rabbies savours too much of the before-mentioned 
pride. But, 

* See his Prolegom. to the Pentateuch, diss. i. 



70 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [< 



2dly. There is another opinion concerning this appellation, 
as applied to Abraham and his posterity, which hath a greater 
appearance of probability : that it comes from the preposition 
12]} gnebher, trans; from whence those that lived beyond, 
or to the east of the river Euphrates, were called by the Ca- 
naanites and others who lived on the west, Dnny gnibhrim. 
Thus Abraham's family, before his call into Canaan, is said to 
have dwelt 11)1 12)}2 bengnebher hannahar, trans fluvium, 
Josh. xxiv. 2 ; meaning, beyond the river Euphrates ; which 
being the greatest river in that part of the world, or that was 
known to the ancient inhabitants of the adjacent countries, they 
used to call it " the river," Kar £?ox>/v. And the people who 
lived east or west of it, styled those on the other side, '* the 
people beyond the river," that is, trans Euphratenses. Thus 
the enemies of the Jews, who wrote from Judea to king Arta- 
xerxes in Babylon, styled themselves " thy servants on this 
side of the river," Ezra iv. 11 ; and the king in his answer di- 
rects to them " beyond the river ;" ver. 17. In the Chaldee, 
indeed, the phrase is the same in both places, mnJ 12]} gnab- 
har naharah, trans Jiuviutn ; and elsewhere we meet with 
this expression, Hadarezer " brought out the Assyrians that 
were beyond the river;" 2 Sam. x. 16. Now it is according 
to this phraseology, so common in Scripture, that Le Clerc 
understands the account we have, that " Shem was the father 
of all the children of Eber," Gen. x. 21, that is, of all the 
people who dwelt east of the Euphrates ; translating 12}} bj 
col bene gnebher, omnes qui trans Jiuvium degunt. He takes 
12V *33 bene gnebher to be a Hebraism, denoting the inha- 
bitants of the country beyond the Euphrates. So the sense 
of the text is, that all this eastern part of the world was 
peopled by Shem's posterity. 

It is supposed that the Canaanites called Abraham, in their 
language, the Hebrew, because he came 12$2 bengnebher , 
from beyond the river. Thus Josephus says, that Niger, the 
president of Idumea, was called UepaiTriQ, because ytvog r\v ek 
tt)q irepL lopdavr^v irspaiag, quod a trans-Jordaneiisi regione ori- 
undus esset* And hence the posterity of Abraham acquired 
the appellation of Dvoy gnibhrim, or Hebrews. 

* De Bello Jucl. lib. ii. cap. xx; sect, iv; edit. Haverc. 



CHAP. 111.] 



HEBREWS. 



n 



It is evident the Seventy understood the word in this sense, 
for they translate Abraham the Hebrew, Gen. xiv. 13, Abra- 
ham TreparriQ, transitor. Thus, among the ancients, Theo- 
doret,* and Jerome,f as well as some others,J and among 
the moderns, Grotius and Le Clerc, understand the word 
Hebrew. 

On the whole, according to this opinion, Hebrew signifies 
much the same as foreigner among us ; or one that comes 
from beyond sea. Such were Abraham and his family among 
the Canaanites ; and his posterity, learning and using the 
language of the country, still retained the appellation origi- 
nally given them, even when they became possessors and set- 
tled inhabitants. In which circumstance the church of Israel 
was, in some sort, a type of that larger church of the Gentiles, 
which was to be called and gathered to Christ, and "to forget 
her own people and her father's house/' Psalm xlv. 10 ; as 
Abraham's family being called out of an idolatrous nation, no 
longer retained the name of the people from whence they 
sprung, but were afterwards called Hebrews or foreigners. 

It is further very probable, that the Israelites being called 
D^gerim, strangers, in David's time, 1 Chron.xxix. 15, might 
refer to their fathers having come into the country over the 
1} gar, ahem, that is, the Euphrates. 

It is, however, objected to this opinion, 

1st. That according to this sense of the word, the posterity 
of Ishmael and Esau might as well have been called Hebrews 
as the posterity of Isaac and Jacob, they being equally the pos- 
terity of Abraham the foreigner, who came "oyi bengnebher, 
from beyond the river. 

To this it may be replied, that very probably they were 
called Hebrews while they continued in Abraham's family ; 
but afterward, when they separated themselves from it, and 
were incorporated into the Canaanitish and other nations by 
intermarriage, they were no longer looked upon as foreigners, 
and so lost that name. Besides, there were personal reasons 
for Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob being called Hebrews, 
which did not afi°ect either Ishmael or Esau. Abraham was 
born beyond the river, where he passed the younger part of his 

* In Gen. qusest. 60. f Inlesai xix. 18. 

X See Buxtorfii Dissert. Philolog. Theolog. dissert, iii. p. 141, 142. 



72 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



life. Isaac would not marry a Canaanite, but went beyond 
the river for a wife. Jacob did the same, and dwelt there for 
upwards of twenty years ; and there all his children, except 
one, were born. But none of these reasons held for continu- 
ing the same appellation to Ishmael and Esau, and their pos- 
terity. 

2dly. It is objected, that the word Hebrew is a name or 
title of honour. As such St. Paul uses it, 2 Cor. xi. 22: 
"Are they Hebrews? So am I." And can we suppose, that 
Jews would glory in being foreigners, and in their ancestors 
coming out of an idolatrous country? 

To this it may be answered, that names are often used in a 
good or bad sense, very different from the import of their de- 
rivation. The word knave hath now a very bad meaning, 
though it is derived from gnavus, diligent or active, and 
though formerly it signified a servant, in whom diligence 
is a very good quality. Who, when he glories in being an 
Englishman, considereth the derivation and original significa- 
tion of the word English ? Besides, it was really an honour 
to the Jews, that God was pleased to call Abraham, the father 
and founder of their nation, out of an idolatrous country, in 
which he had been born and educated, and to separate him 
and his posterity from all other nations, to be his peculiar 
people and visible church. 

A farther reason of St. Paul's glorying in his being an He- 
brew, and consequently a farther answer to this objection, 
will be shortly produced. 

3dly. Another objection against the second, and in favour 
of the first opinion, is taken from Balaam's prophecy : "And 
ships shall come from the coast of Chittim, and shall afflict 
Ashur, and shall afflict Eber," Numb. xxiv. 24, two branches 
of Shem's family ; Gen. x. 22. 24. Now, if it be admitted, 
that the Assyrians were called by the name of Ashur, because 
he was their primogenitor ; can it be reasonably denied, or 
doubted, that the Jews are called Hebrews from Eber? 

I reply, If by Eber be, in this place, meant the Jews, this 
argument will have considerable weight. But if the prophecy 
refers to Alexander's conquest, which Grotius says is very 
plain, quod nemo non videt, then Eber cannot here mean the 
people of Israel, since they were not afflicted by Alexander, 



CHAP. III.] 



HEBREW OF THE HEBREWS. 



73 



as other nations were, but remarkably and miraculously pre- 
served from his ravages. If, therefore, we take the word 
Eber to come from "DJ7 gnebher, trans, it must here mean, 
as Grotius and Le Clerc understand it, the other nations (as 
well as the Assyrians) that lay east of the river Euphrates. 

Thus much for the derivation and import of the word 
Hebrew. 

There is a very remarkable appellation which the apostle 
Paul, after glorying in his being " of the stock of Israel, and 
of the tribe of Benjamin," applies to himself, namely, that he 
was " an Hebrew of the Hebrews;" Phil. iii. 5. By this ex- 
pression Godwin understands an Hebrew both by father's and 
mother's side. But if this be all that the phrase imports, 
there seems to be very little occasion for the apostle's using 
it immediately after having declared, that he was " of the 
stock of Israel, and the tribe of Benjamin;" which, on God- 
win's supposition, is the same as an Hebrew of the Hebrews; 
for the Jews were not allowed to marry out of their own na- 
tion : or if they sometimes married proselytes, yet their num- 
ber was comparatively so small among them, especially while 
they were under oppression, as they were at that time by the 
Romans, that methinks Paul would hardly have mentioned it 
as a distinguishing privilege and honour, that neither of his 
parents were proselytes. It is therefore a much more probable 
sense, that a Hebrew of the Hebrews signifies a Hebrew both 
by nation and language, which multitudes of Abraham's pos- 
terity, in those days, were not; or one of the Hebrew Jews, 
who performed their public worship in the Hebrew tongue; 
for such were reckoned more honourable than the Hellenistic 
Jews, who in their dispersion having, in a manner, lost the 
Hebrew, used the Greek language in sacris, and read the 
Scripture out of the Septuagint version. We meet with this 
distinction amongst the converted Jews, in the Acts of the 
Apostles : " In those days, when the number of the disciples 
was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians or 
Hellenists against the Hebrews;" Acts vi. 1. This is what 
St. Paul probably meant by his being a Hebrew, as distin- 
guished from an Israelite ; 2 Cor. xi. 22. " Are they Hebrews ? 
So am L Are they Israelites? So am h" In one sense, 
these were convertible terms, both signifying Jews by nation 



74 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



and religion; but in the sense just mentioned, there were 
many, in those days, who were Israelites, but not Hebrews. 
St. Paul was both, not only an Israelite by birth, but a He- 
brew, and not an Hellenistic Jew. 

Godwin expresses ^himself inaccurately, when he saith, that 
those who lived in Palestine, and who, as using the Hebrew 
text in their public worship, were opposed to the ' EXXtj viarai, 
are called Hebrews, or Jews. For, though Hebrew and 
Jew are convertible terms, when opposed to Gentiles, as de- 
noting the seed of Abraham, and professors of the Mosaic re- 
ligion, see Jer. xxxiv. 9 ; yet, as opposed to the 'EXXrjvforat, 
they are not convertible terms, there being Hebrew Jews and 
Hellenistic Jews; for it is said, that when " they, who were 
scattered by the persecution that arose about Stephen, tra- 
velled into several countries, preaching the word to none but 
Jews only," yet they spoke, irpog roue 'EXXTjvtorac, to the Hel- 
lenists or Grecians; Acts xi. 19, 20. # 

In order to confirm the sense which I have given of the 
word ' EXXtj vioTai, in opposition to the appellation Hebrews, it 
is proper we should take notice of the distinction between the 
'EXXrjvte and 'EXX^viarm. The former were Greeks by nation, 
and as such distinguished from Jews, Acts xvi. 1; xix, 10; 
and the Greek empire having been rendered by Alexander in 
a manner universal, and their language being then the most 
common and general, the appellation Greeks is sometimes 

* In the strictest sense, this appellation D'Hin^ Jehudim, lovdaioi, or Jews, 
belongs only to the posterity and tribe of Judah. Hebrews, in the full ex- 
tent of the word, were the posterity of Abraham the Hebrew; Israelites, 
the posterity of Jacob, or Israel; and Jews, the posterity of Judah, one of 
the sons of Israel. But after the division of Abraham's and Israel's pos- 
terity into two kingdoms, under Rehoboam and Jeroboam, the one was 
called the kingdom of Judah, because the tribe of Judah had the greater 
part of it, and also because the kings were of that tribe ; the other, consist- 
ing of ten tribes, was called the kingdom of Israel. From hence arose a 
distinction between Jews and Israelites. Thus, by the Jews which the king 
of Assyria drove from Elath, 2 Kings xvi. 6, are meant the subjects of the 
kingdom of Judah ; for to that kingdom Elath had been restored by Aza- 
riah some years before; 2 Kings xiv. 22. But as the ten tribes were after- 
ward, in a manner, lost in the Assyrian captivity (as hath been shown be- 
fore), and the kingdom of Judah only continued through succeeding ages a 
body politic, the name Jews came to be applied indifferently to all Hebrews 
and Israelites. 



CHAP. 111.] 



HELLENISTS. 



75 



given to the whole heathen world, or to all who were not 
Jews ; Rom. i. 16 ; ii. 9. 

These Greeks, called r EXX?]v«cot by Josephus, are always 
styled r EXXi?v£c in the New Testament. On which account 
Grotius, understanding by the 'EXXr^viarai, or " Grecians, to 
whom some of those w T ho were dispersed on the persecution 
which arose about Stephen, preached the Lord Jesus," 
Acts xi. 19, 20, Greeks by nation, concludes there is a mis- 
take in the text, and alters it according to the Syriac and Vul- 
gate versions : " certe legendum," saith he, u irpoq rovg f EXXrj- 
vaq." So indeed the Alexandrian manuscript reads, but is 
supported by no other copy. And which, I think, is decisive 
against it, it is evident, from the words immediately pre- 
ceding, that these Grecians were by nation Jews, and not 
Greeks, it being expressly said, that those who were scattered 
on the persecution " preached the gospel to the Jews only." 
As for the 'EWriveg, or Greeks, mentioned in St. John's Gospel, 
chap. xii. 20, as being come to Jerusalem at the passover to 
worship in the temple, and likewise those mentioned in the 
Acts, as worshipping along with the Jews in the synagogues; 
chap. xiv. 1 ; xviii. 4 ; they were doubtless Greeks by birth 
and nation, yet proselytes to the Jewish religion. There is a 
distinction made between Jews and proselytes, Acts ii. 10; but 
none between Hebrews and proselytes, because a proselyte 
might be either an Hebrew or an Hellenist, according to the 
language in which he performed public worship. 

That the Hellenists, or Grecians, were Jews, is further 
argued from the account we have, chap. ix. 29, that when at 
Jerusalem St. Paul " disputed against the Grecians, they 
went about to slay him," as the Jews at Damascus had done 
before, ver. 23. Now had these Grecians been strangers of 
a different nation, it cannot be imagined they durst have at- 
tempted to kill a Jew, among his own countrymen, in the 
capital, and without a formal accusation of him before any of 
their tribunals. 

Upon the whole, the 1 EXXtj viarm, or Grecians, being Jews 
who used the Greek tongue in their sacred exercises, the He- 
brew Jews and Grecian Jews were distinguished in those 
days, in like manner as the Portuguese and Dutch Jews are 
among us, not so much by the place of their birth (many be- 



76 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK 1. 

ing born in England, others abroad), as by the language they 
use in their public prayers and sermons. 

I have already observed, that the language which the 
Grecians used in sacris, was that of the Septuagint, which is 
likewise the language of the New Testament. It hath been, 
therefore, by some called the Hellenistic tongue, to distinguish 
it from pure Greek, while others, rejecting the distinction, 
assert the purity of the New Testament Greek. A con- 
siderable dispute hath hereupon arisen in the learned world, 
with which it is proper we should not be unacquainted. 

Concerning the Language of the New Testament. 

Scaliger, observing that the phraseology in the New Testa- 
ment agrees with that of the Septuagint, calls it the Hellen- 
istic dialect. Heinsius imagined it to be a language different 
from the pure Greek, as the Italian is from the Latin, and 
peculiar to the Hellenists ; a people, he supposes, who dwelt 
in Asia, and in several of those eastern parts. He was op- 
posed by Salmasius. # Phocenius, also, engaged in this con- 
troversy, and maintained the purity of the New Testament 
Greek. To him Gataker replied in his piece, De Stylo Novi 
Testamenti. 

The common opinion is, that the Greek of the New Testa- 
ment is neither pure, nor a new language ; but may properly 
be called the Hellenistic dialect ; inasmuch as the words are 
sometimes used in a different sense, and different construction, 
from what they are in other authors. There is, also, a mix- 
ture of Latin, Persic, and Syro-chaldaic words, besides sole- 
cisms and Hebraisms. 

1st. The following Latin words are mentioned : tcoSpavrriq, 
quadrans, Matt. v. 26; ktqvgoq, census, chap. xvii. 25; drjvapiov, 
denarius, chap.xviii. 28; \syeu)v, legio, chap. xxvi. 53; irpaL- 
rwpLov, prcetorium, chap, xxvii. 27 ; KowzwSia, custodia, ver. 65 ; 

* " Hebraeus nomen gentis est," saith Salmasius, " Hellenistes dialecti. 
Hoc convenit omnibus hominibus graece scientibus et loquentibus, quia 
gentem non denotat, sed omnem hominem kKkyvij-ovra." De Lingua Hellen- 
istica Comment, p. 191, edit. Lugd. Bat. 1643; in support of which piece he 
published the same year his Funus Linguas Hellenisticse, against Heinsius's 
Exercitat. de Hellenistis et Ling. Hellenist. 



CM AV. III.] 



N E W TESTAMENT GREEK. 



77 



(TirticovXctTcjp, spiculator, Mark vi. 27 ; tctvTvpiuiv, centurio, chap, 
xv. 39; KoXwvia, colonia, Acts xvi. 12; aov^apiov, sndarium, 
chap. xix. 12; juaiceXXov, macellum, 1 Cor. x. 25; ^np>pava, 
membra na, 2 Tim. iv. 13. 

Instances of Latin phrases are <xuuj3ouXiov Xafitiv, concilium 
capere, Matt. xii. 14; zpyamav dovvai, operam dare, Luke xii. 
58. Besides Latin, there are, 

2dly. Persic words ; as juayot, ?nagi, Matt. ii. 1 ; yaZ,a, 
thesaurus, Acts viii. 27 (the proper Greek word is ^r\aavpog) ; 
and likewise yaZ,o(j>v\aKiov, John viii. 20. There are also, 

3dly. Syro-chaldaic words ; as, Afifia, Mark xiv. 36; AkbX- 
Safia, Acts i. 19 ; j3n&«rSa, John v - 2 J E^aSa, Mark vii. 34; 
ToXyo^a, Matt, xxvii. 33 ; tcopfiav, Mark vii. 11 ; pwca, Matt, 
v. 22 : and whole sentences; as EXwt, EXan, Xauua aafiaxSavi, 
Mark xv. 34; fiapav a%a, 1 Cor. xvi. 22; TaXtia, kov}xi, Mark 
v. 41. 

Various instances of solecisms are alleged; as, Katvy SiaSriKy 

£V Tip aiflClTl fXOV, TO VTTtp VfXU)V ^K^VVOfl^VOV , for CJC^VVOjUC Vld, 

which it should be in regular construction with toj aifiaTi, Luke 
xxii. 20. And the following : enro Irjaou Xpi^ov, 6 fxapTvq, 6 iri^og 
— Tip ayonrriaavTi ii/nag — kcu eiroinasv rjfiag, &C, Rev. i. 5, 6. 
Again, 6 vikwv, <Ww aurw, &c, chap. iii. 21. In like man- 
ner, 6 viKMv, 7roir]a(jj avTov gtvXov, &c, ver. 12. And also, tk\v 
So£av avTov, — Tr\r]pr)Q yapiTOQ, &c, John i. 14. 

Several methods have been taken to make out the gram- 
matical construction of these passages. But the attempt is 
needless; Gatakei* having shown, that such solecisms are 
common in the purest Greek writers : and, indeed, they are 
often looked upon as beauties, rather than blemishes. 

Hebraisms are observed in abundance, and that both in 
words and phrases, in construction and in figures. 

In the first place, Hebraisms in single words are of three 
sorts : — such as are properly of a Hebrew extract : such as 
are indeed of a Greek extract, but used in a different sense 
from what they are in other authors, and in a manner con- 
formable to the Hebrew : and words, new coined, to trans- 
late Hebrew words by. 

* Annot. in Marc. Antonin. lib. iii. sect. iv. 



78 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



1st. There are words of an Hebrew extract, which have 
either a Greek termination, as Mtamag, John i. 42; Saravac, 
Matt. iv. 10; aiKepa, Luke i. 15, potus inebrians, from "Dttf 
shechar : or others which retain the Hebrew termination, as 
AXXr^Xovia, Rev. xix. 1 ; crafiawS, Rom. ix.29; A/3aS<W, Rev. 
ix. 11. 

2dly. There are Greek words, used in a different sense from 
what they are in other authors, and in a manner conformable 
to the Hebrew ; as fiifiXog for a catalogue, like "1DD sepher ; 
/3<j3Aoc yev£<Tto)Q \t)<jov Xpi~-ov, Matt. i. 1 ; DIN Dlb)D 1DD 
sepher toledhath Adam, Gen. v. 1. Etc, pia, tv, is always a 
cardinal, except in the New Testament, where it is frequently 
an ordinal, like UlN achedh, in Hebrew ; as, tk)q fxiag crafifiaTw, 
Mark xvi. 2, primo die hebdomadis, or 7rpa)TT\ aafifiarov, as it 
is presently after explained, ver. 9 : Kara jxiav aafifiaTwv, 
1 Cor. xvi. 2 : like Winb mm beechadh lachodesh, the first 
day of the month. 'Pi^ua in Greek signifies a word, but in the 
New Testament it sometimes signifies a thing ; like tW dhab- 
har ; otl ovk acWarrjcra rrapa r<j> Oe^ irav pt]/xa, Luke i. 37. 
AiroKpLvofiai signifies properly, to answer when another hath 
already spoken ; but in the New Testament it is used for taking 
occasion to speak, without having been spoken to ; like ruy 
gnanah, in Hebrew : Km cnroicpiSeiQ 6 \y\aovg slttsv avrt], nempe, 
(jvkti' MrjKeri sic gov uq tov aiwva ovdeig Kapwov (payor " And 
Jesus answering, said to the fig-tree," &c, Mark xi. 14. 
E^o/LtoXoyeiv strictly means, to confess ; but in the New Tes- 
tament, to thank or praise ; which is evidently a translation of 
the Hebrew word min hodhah, in Hiphil, from jadhah ; 
" And at that time Jesus answered and said, E ^o/xoXoy ov/xat goi, 
7rarep, KvpiE tov ovpavov Km rr\g yrjg, otl aweicpvipaQ TavTa," &c. 
Uspav signifies trans, as beyond, or on the other side of a river ; 
but in the New Testament it is used for near to, without deter- 
mining on which side. Thus we read of " the land of Zabulon, 
and the land of Naphthali, by the way of the sea, -nrepav tov 
lop^avov, Galilee of the Gentiles," Matt. iv. 15 ; that is, near, or 
about Jordan ; for neither Zabulon, nor Naphthali, nor Galilee 
of the Gentiles, were beyond (as our translators have expressed 
it), but near Jordan. Ylspav, then, is a translation of ~Qy gneb- 
her, which signifies near to, on either side, as well as beyond. 



( HAP. 111.] NEW TESTAMENT GREEK. 



79 



Thus Moses is said to have stood p^n I^JD bengnebher 
hajjarden, Deut. i. 1 ; that is, near Jordan, for he never 
went over it into Canaan ; Deut. xxxii. 52. There are, 

3dly. Some words new coined, to translate Hebrew words 
by ; as avaSripaTtZw, for Din charam ; 6 rtp^aro avaOepaTiZstv 
Kdi ofivvuv' oti ovk oi§a tov avSpwnov, Mark xiv. 71. 

S7rX«7x v ^°i ua< » a wor( ^ formed to translate Dm racham, in- 
time dilexit: 6 ds Iriaovg — tiire, airXayyviZopai tm tov o^Xov, oti 
r/Sou ijpepag Tpug irpoapzvovat pot, kcii ovk ^\ovgl tl tyaybxri, 
Matt. xv. 32. XapiToa), to translate pn chanan, gratiosus fait: 
O ayytXog irpog avTt]v enre, Xaipe, Ke\apiT(x)pevr), Luke i. 28- 

Secondly. Hebraisms in phrases, are either, 

1st. Such as have not been used by other Greek authors : as, 
seeing of life and death, for living and dying: Wkwrm Evw^ 
jucTcreS-rj tov /17? iSslv SavaTov, Heb. xi. 5. In like manner the 
Hebrew, mD-HiO xb) velo jireh-maveth ; Psalm lxxxix. 49 
Heb., 48 Engl. Again, e^cX^Xv^orag €»c tt/c otxpvog Afipaap, 
is analogous to the following expression : " All the souls that 
came with Jacob into Egypt, w&jotsejerecho, who came 
out of his loins," Sec., Gea. xlvi. 25 Heb., 26 Engl. Or, 

2dly. Such as have not been used by other Greek writers in 
the same sense as in the New Testament ; as, to hear the voice 
of a person, signifies, to obey : Hag 6 ljv ckttjc aXrf^eiag, clkovei 
pov njc (j)d)V7]g, John xviii. 37, parallel with "jnttf* b)pb D^DI^ <0 
chi shemangta lekol ishteka ; Gen. iii. 17. To eat bread, 
signifies, to sit down to a meal ; Ov yap vmTovTai Tag ytipag 
avTtvv, oTav apTov tcrSiwmv, Matt. xv. 2, which is an expression 
parallel to this, " And they made ready the present against 
Joseph came at noon; for they heard, D\lb "ibsN^ Ditf *3 chi sham 
jochelu lachem, that they should eat bread there;" Gen. xliii. 
24 Heb., 25 Engl. 

There are also pleonasms in the Greek Testament, such 
as do not occur in other Greek authors. As, Ewapag ovv 6 lr)<rovg 
Tovg oQSaXpovg KaiSeavaptvog oTiiroXvg&c." When Jesus then 
lift up his eyes and saw a great company," &c, John vi. 5. 
Parallel to this in the Hebrew, N^l JJttgMTK DrmN KttW vajjissa 
Abraham eth-gneinaiv vajjare : "And Abraham lift up his 
eyes, and saw the place," &c. Gen.xxii.4. Again, OpoSvpaSov 
r\pav <fcu)vr)v irpog tov Qeov, teat utcov, " they lift up their voice to 
God with one accord, and said," Acts iv. 24: like the follow- 



80 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK !. 



ing in the Hebrew : " And when they told it to Jotham, he 
went and stood in the top of mount Gerizim, and lift up his 
voice, and cried, and said unto them, IDNVI fcOpvi "6ip nw^ vaj- 
jissa kolo vajjikra vajjomer Judges ix. 7. Again, Eia-eivag 
ty}v x a l° a TJ^aTO avrov 6 Irja-ouc, " Jesus put forth his hand, and 
touched him," &c; Matt, viii.3. Like that expression con- 
cerning Noah, iO^ nnp^ 1T> nb\V^ vajjishlach jadho vajjakka- 
cheha vajjabhee ; " And he put forth his hand, and took her" 
(the dove), ''And pulled her in unto him into the ark ;" Gen. 
viii. 9. 

Thirdly. There are constructions in the New Testament, 
which are said to be Hebraisms : as, 

1st. The feminine gender for the neuter: Aidov ov 
cnr£($OKifia(jav 6i OfKoSououvrtc, auroc tyevii%r) «c Ke(j>aKt]v ywviag' 
napa Kvptov eyevtro avry, tcai ecrrt zavjiaarij, Sec. ; -Matt. xxi. 42. 

r»6D3 ksi jin? nr^n mm dnd mo vxrb nrwi hajethah lerosh 
pinnah, meeth Jehovah hajethah zoth hi fiiphlath, &c; Psalm 
cxviii. 23. In like manner, irpnN nmN mm-nND >rV?N;tf ni7N 
achath shaalti meeth Jehovah othah abakkesh ; Psalm xxvii. 4. 
Some, indeed, make K£0aXrjv to be the antecedent to avry 
(H3D pinnah to N>n hi), and not the whole preceding sentence ; 
and they render the clause, —apa Kvptov eyevero awry, a Domino 
constitutus est ille annularis; agreeable to the sense of 
zyevETO in this passage, To aafifiarov $ia rov avZpwTrov zytvtTo, 
Mark ii. 27. 

2dly. A noun repeated twice to express a distribution into 
several parts: as, " He commanded them all to sit dow T n, 
avfi-oaia avfiTToaia, by companies, and they sat, -rrpacFiat -n-pacxiai, 
in ranks," Mark vi. 39, 40: like this Hebrew expression, 
" He delivered them into the hands of his servants, ~ny Tip 
gnedher, gnedher, every drove by themselves Gen. xxxii. 
16. Again, " He called unto him the twelve, and began to 
send them forth, o\»o Svo, by two and two," Mark vi. 7; like 
the following Hebrew^ phrase, " of every clean beast thou 
shalt take to thee, HJtettf ru/nii* shibhngnah shibhngnah, by 
sevens ;" Gen. vii. 2. The regular expression is ava §vo, as it 
is in the parallel place, Luke x. 1. 

3dly. The superlative degree expressed by the addition 
of Gtoc: " In which time Moses was born, and was aaruog 
Geok exceeding fair ;" Acts vii. 20. Thus, in Hebrew it is 



CHAP. III.] NEW TESTAMENT GREEK. 



8] 



said, " Nineveh was, DV7^ nVnj-^y pw* gadholah lelohim, 
an exceeding great city ; Jonah iii. 3. 

4thly. Some verbs are said to be used with different con- 
structions from what they are in other Greek authors ; as 
7rpocncvvEii) with a dative case : \z7rp0g fX^wv TrpoazKvvu avrw, 
Matt. viii. 2. Again, km irpoatKvvricTav avrto, John ix. 38 ; 
whereas in other authors it governs an accusative. So also 
eivm sig n, for uvai tl, is said to be an Hebraism : " For this 
cause shall a man leave father and mother, and cleave to his 
wife, kcii Ecrovrai 01 Svo eig crapKa piav," Matt. xix. 5. " Unto 
them who be disobedient, the stone which the builders disal- 
lowed, ovtoq tytvriSri sig ke^ciXijv ywvLag" 1 Pet. ii. 7. Thus 
in Hebrew, " God is the Lord, and he hath enlightened us," 
Kb ikm vajjaer lanu ; Psalm cxviii. 27. 

Fourthly. There are Hebrew figures observed in the New 
Testament ; as, 

1st. Enallage of the case, person, number, and gender. 
Enallage of the case, f O vlkwv, <Ww avrio, &c, Rev. ii. 26; 
f O vlkwv, 7TOLr](7(i) avrov, Rev. iii. 12 ; EXaXrj<7£ irpog rovg 7rarepag 
i]fUx)v, tw Afipaap., Km rw GirtppaTL avrov, Luke i. 55; Ylav pripa 
apyov, cnroSwcrovGi Trspi avrov \oyov, Matt. xii. 36; AiSov, ov 
cnreSoKipaaav, ovrog eyevr]^r}, 8cc, Matt. xxi. 42 ; 'O yap Mwffjjr 
bvrog — ovk oidapev tl yeyovev avrw, Acts vii. 40. See the like 
kind of expression in the Hebrew, 1D"H D>DD : bxn Had, ta- 
mim, darco; Psalm xviii. 30. 

Enallage of the person : " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou 
that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent irpog 
avrrjv, how often would I have gathered ra reKva om>," Matt, 
xxiii. 37. Thus in the Hebrew: " I was wroth with my peo- 
ple, ^ny-by SlD¥p katsaphti gnal-gnammi, &c, thou didst 
show them no mercy, DOT onb nDltf-*6 lo-samt lahem ra- 
chamim ;" Isa. xlvii. 6. 

Enallage of number : f At that time Jesus went roig <xa/3- 
flam cua tiov GTropiptov," Matt. xii. 1. And, 

Of gender : " Not holding rr\v K^aXrjv, t% ov, the whole 
- body by joints and bands," &c. ; Col. ii. 19. 

2dly. Pleonasms are said to be borrowed from the Hebrew. 
I have mentioned some already, and shall add the following : 
" That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all 
the Gentiles, e<j> ovg £7nK£fcXTjrcu ro ovopa pov sir avrovg/* 

G 



82 



JEWISH ANTIQL[Tlli,S. 



[nook L 



Acts xv. 17. Thus in the Hebrew, " Every place," &c. 
"Q DD^Jn-rp "pin H&H asher tidhrok caph-raglechem bo; Josh, 
i. 3. Again ; ''To the woman were given two wings of a great 
eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, 
o7rov TpefeTdi £K£t," Rev. xii. 14. Similar to this instance in 
the Hebrew : " Then said Saul to his servant, Well said ; 
come, let us go : so they went unto the city DWNn ttfvN D&'-T^N 
asher-sham ish Haelohim ;" 1 Sam. ix. 10. Again, Pilate 
said, AS'woe £*jut cnro tov cufiarog, &c, Matt, xxvii. 24 ; and 
St. Paul, on KaSapog tyu) airo tov aifiarog iravTU)v y Acts 
xx. 26, where enro seems to be redundant. The following is 
a similar Hebrew expression: "When David heard it, he 
said, <>DnD — ^ naki anchi — middeme AbnZr ;" 

2 Sam. iii. 28. 

3dly. Ellipsis is a common figure in the New Testament, 
after the manner of the Hebrew : for instance, " Behold I 
send unto you prophets, and wise men, and Scribes, Kcu t!f 
avTwv cnroKTtvsiTE Kai arravpwa^Te, Km tl£ aurwv fiaGTiywatT*" 
&c, Matt, xxiii. 34. Like the following expression in the 
Second Book of Kings : " And Jehu went — into the house of 
Baal, and said unto the worshippers of Baal, Search and look, 
lest there be here with you mrr> nnyD mhignabhdhe Jehovah;" 
2 Kings x. 23. 

However, after all the exceptions to the purity of the New 
Testament Greek, it hath as able critics among its advocates 
as any that have appeared on the contrary side, particularly 
Mr. Blackwall, who, in his Sacred Classics, maintains the lan- 
guage of the New Testament to be not only pure, but very 
elegant Greek. He hath vindicated, with great learning, the 
several passages excepted against, producing parallel ones out 
of the purest authors . He denies there are any solecisms, having 
not only well supported the suspected places, but generally 
shown a peculiar beauty in them. It is a remark of Mr. Ad- 
dison, that the most exquisite words and finest strokes of an 
author are those which often appear the most doubtful and 
exceptionable to a man who wants a relish for polite learning, 
and which a sour undistinguishing critic attacks with the great- 
est violence. Tully observes, that it is very easy to brand or 
fix a mark, upon what he calls verbum ardens, a bold, glow- 
ing expression, and to turn it into ridicule by a cold, ill-na- 



C HAP. III.] NEW TESTAMENT GREEK. 



tured criticism. Black wall acknowledges the New Testament 
hath words and expressions not to be found in any classic 
author ; nor could it be otherwise, when it treats of things 
which the heathens had no ideas of, nor any words for. New 
names must be given to new things. In this respect no other 
liberty is taken than is freely done by Tully, Plato, and the 
greatest genuises of all ages. 

As for the mixture of foreign words, especially Latin, there 
are not many. However, in the use of these few, the sacred 
writers are equally to be vindicated, at least, with the Greek 
classics, who have many foreign, particularly Persic words. 
For, as the most eminent of them flourished at a time when 
the empire of the Persians was of vast extent, and had a great 
influence on the affairs of Greece, many of their words became 
familiar to, and were adopted by the Greeks. In the times of 
the apostles and evangelists, the Roman empire having ex- 
tended its conquests over all the countries where Greek was 
spoke, by that means Roman words and phrases crept in, as 
before Persic had done. As to Hebraisms, the reason why the 
New Testament writers mingled them with their Greek, does 
not seem to be owing so much to their being Hebrews, as to 
their discoursing of many things relating to the Mosaic law, 
and capable of being well expressed in the Hebrew language, 
which could not be expressed so happily, if at all, in any other. 
So that if they had declined using the Hebrew idiom, they 
must have invented new words and phrases, which would not 
have been easily or soon understood. Mr. Blackwall ob- 
serves, that in common morals, in matters of conversation and 
historical narrative, they use the same words and phrases with 
Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, &c, and that they do not 
more differ from the classics in their form of expression, than 
these do from one another. 

A great many expressions, originally Hebraisms, have, by 
the best authors, been transplanted into the Greek tongue, 
and are now become proper and genuine phrases. But the 
sacred writers, being better acquainted with the Hebrew lan- 
guage, have remarkably enriched their style from that inex- 
haustible mine, to which the Greeks had little access. 

Upon the whole, he is confident, that if a man reads the 
New Testament with a heart as much prepossessed in its 

g 2 



84 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



favour as when he sits down to Virgil or Homer, he will find 
incidents and sentiments therein, expressed with more natural 
propriety and energy than can be found in their writings, 
though in every age since they wrote they have been the ob- 
jects of universal admiration. 

I am loth to dismiss the subject we are upon, without giving 
you an abstract of this author's critique upon the several 
writers of the New Testament.* 

St. Matthew, saith he, hath all the characters of a good his- 
torian; truth and impartiality, clearness of narration, propriety 
and gravity of diction, and order of time well observed. The 
two next evangelists often borrow his very words and form of 
expression, when they are on the same subject, and yet each 
has his proper style. 

St. Mark has a comprehensive, clear, and beautiful brevity. 
He sometimes uses the repetition of words of the same origi- 
nal and like sound, as the most vigorous authors do: such as 
cnrtcrTzyacrav rrjv ortyi/v, Mark ii. 4; zv ri] avaaraau brav avaa- 
twoi, chap. xii. 23; ktkt£u)q, rjg ekthtev, chap. xiii. 19. 

St. Luke's style is pure, copious, and flowing. He ac- 
quaints us with numerous historical passages, not related by 
the other evangelists. He is justly applauded for his polite- 
ness and elegance by some critics, who seem, however, to 
magnify him in order to depreciate his brethren, notwith- 
standing he hath as many Hebraisms and peculiarities as any 
of them. 

The style of St. John is grave and simple, short and con- 
spicuous, always plain, and sometimes low ; but he reacheth to 
the heavens in the sublimity of his notions. He has frequent 
repetitions, in order to press his important doctrines with more 
closeness and vehemence. He often takes one thing two 
ways, both in the affirmative and negative : as, " He that 
hath the Son hath life ; but he that hath not the Son, hath not 
life." 

St. Paul is admired for the copiousness and variety of his 
style, for the loftiness of his sentiment, for the dexterity of 
his address. He has every charm of eloquence, and shows 
himself, occasionally, master of every style. " If any," saith 

* See vol. i. part. ii. chap. vii. 



CHAP. III.] NEW TESTAMENT WRITERS. 



85 



Mr. Locke, " hath thought St. Paul a loose writer, it was 
only because he was a loose reader ; for he that takes notice of 
his design, will find there is scarce a word or expression he 
makes use of, except with relation and tendency to his present 
main purpose." 

Erasmus passes a bold censure upon St. James, when he 
saith, " The epistle under his name does not everywhere ex- 
press the apostolical gravity and majesty."* But other learned 
and judicious persons have imagined they have discovered in 
that epistle, vigorous and expressive words, a beautiful sim- 
plicity, natural and engaging sentiments, lively figures, and 
substantial eloquence. Where can a finer description of the 
malignity and mischief of an unbridled tongue be found, than 
in his third chapter ? The emphasis and eloquence of that 
sublime description of the divine munificence and immutabilty, 
in the seventeenth verse of the first chapter, is greatly and 
justly admired .f 

St. Peter's style expresses the noble vehemence and fervour 
of his spirit. He writes with that quickness and rapidity, 
sometimes neglecting the formal niceties of grammar (as is 
common with sublime geniuses), that you can scarcely per- 
ceive the pauses of his discourse, and the distinction of his 
periods. His description of the conflagration and future 
judgment, 2 Pet. hi., is a master-piece. He makes us see, as 
it were, the heavens and the earth wrapt up in devouring 
flames, and hear the groans of an expiring world, and the 
crush of nature tumbling into universal ruin. And how so- 
lemn and moving is the epiphonema, or practical inference, 
" Seeing, therefore, all these things must be dissolved, what 
manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and 
godliness ver. 11. 

Origen saith, that " Jude hath wrote an epistle, of few 

* Vid. Annot. in cap. v. sub fine. 

f The first words of that passage are a fine hexameter, 

Tlacra Soais aya&ri, /cat irav Swpij^to reAeiov. 

A small transposition of the next words, will make another hexameter, 

E<rr' airo rwv (purwu irarpos Kauraficuvov ai/oo&ev. 

How naturally do sublime sentiments give birth to poetical numbers, as well 
as poetical expressions ! 



86 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[ BOOK I. 



verses, indeed, but full of vigorous expressions of heavenly- 
grace. " # This apostle adopts the sentiment, and frequently 
the words of St. Peter, in the second chapter of his second 
epistle, though sometimes he leaves out some of his words, at 
other times he enlarges, and gives a different turn to the 
thought. These two writers are very near akin, in subject, 
style, vehemence, and just indignation against impudence, 
lewdness, and debauchers of sound principles. They answer 
one another in the New Testament, as the prophecy of Oba- 
diah and part of the forty-ninth of Jeremiah do in the Old. 

After Mr. Blackwall hath fully vindicated the writers of the 
New Testament, and set them, at least, upon a level with the 
best classics, he shows, in the last chapter, what advantages 
they have over them in various respects. The greater part of 
the second volume is a critique upon the versions and various 
lections of the New Testament, which it is beside our present 
purpose to consider. 

We return, now, from this digression, to the subject of 
Jewish Antiquities. 

The Genealogies of the Hebrews . 

Godwin observes, that " the whole body of Israel, or the 
Hebrew nation, was divided into twelve tribes, and that pub- 
lic records were kept, wherein every one's genealogy was re- 
gistered, to manifest to what particular tribe he belonged." 
This appears from the following passage in Chronicles : " The 
acts of Rehoboam — are they not written in the book of She- 
maiah the prophet, and of Iddo the seer, concerning gene- 
alogies ?" 2 Chron. xiii. 15: wn s nrf? lehithjaches, in genealo- 
gizando, that is, probably, in their genealogical tables of the 
royal families of the house of David ; in which, also, it seems 
was interspersed some account of the lives and actions of the 
kings ; the acts of Rehoboam being not only written in this 
book, but likewise the " acts of his son Abijah, his ways and 
his sayings;" 2 Chron. xiii. 22. In the fifth chapter of the 
First Book of Chronicles, after an abstract of the genealogies 



* Comment, in Matt. xii. 55, p. 223, D. edit. Huet. Colon. 1685. 



CHAP. III.] GENEALOGIES OF THE HEBREWS. 87 

contained in the book of Genesis, and of some of the tribes 
of Israel to the time of the captivity, it is added, " All these 
were reckoned by genealogies in the days of Jotham king of 
Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam king of Israel," ver. 17 ; 
that is, the genealogical tables were then drawn up, which 
afterwards were continued down to the captivity, the names 
of several persons being inserted, who did not live till after 
the days of Jotham and Jeroboam. And then, after a gene- 
alogical table of the other tribes in the three next chapters, it 
follows, " So all Israel were reckoned by genealogies ; and 
behold they were written in the book of the kings of Israel 
and Judah chap. ix. 1 . Where, by " the book of the kings," 
cannot be meant those two historical books, which now pass 
under that name, these genealogies not being written therein, 
but some authentic public record of their genealogies, called 
" the King's Book," probably as being under his custody ; 
of which it is not unlikely there was a duplicate, one copy 
kept by the king of Judah, the other by the king of Israel, 
for it is called the Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah." 

The story of Herod's destroying the records of the ge- 
nealogies, which Godwin mentions, is related by Eusebius in 
his Ecclesiastical History.* Yet it does not seem that the 
Jews lost all account of their genealogies from that time, for 
they continued their distinction of tribes long after. St. Paul 
says he was of the " tribe of Benjamin ;" Phil. iii. 5. St. James 
writes to the " twelve tribes that were scattered abroad 
James i. 1. And, later still, Josephus gives the genealogy of 
his own family in his Life, and says, " I give you this succes- 
sion of our family, as I find it written in the public tables. "f 
And he adds, that " all their priests were obliged to prove 
their succession from an ancient line ;" and if they could not 
do it, they were to be excluded from officiating as priests. 
From whence it appears, there were public genealogical tables 
of their tribes and families as late as Josephus, who lived at 
the destruction of Jerusalem. By the way, therefore, it may 
be reasonably presumed, that both St. Matthew and St. Luke 
copied their genealogies of Christ, the one of the line of Mary, 
the other of Joseph, out of the public records which were 

* Lib. i. cap. vii. p. 24, edit. Reading, Cantab. 1720. 

f Joseph, in vita, sect. i. ad fin. apud Qper. torn. ii. p. 1, edit. Haverc. 



88 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



deemed authentic vouchers. The apostle, accordingly, re- 
presents it as a thing evident to the Jews, that " our Lord 
sprung out of Judah f - Heb. vi. 14. It was so by their own 
genealogical tables, which the sacred historians faithfully 
copied. If there were any errors in those tables, they were 
not accountable for them, their business was only to transcribe 
without alteration ; tampering with them might have created 
suspicion, and given the Jews some colour for denying that 
our Lord " sprung out of Judah," according to the ancient 
prophecies concerning the Messiah. 

Upon the whole, we must either conclude, that Eusebius 
had been entirely misinformed concerning Herod's burning 
the genealogical records, or that if one copy (perhaps that 
which was laid up in the archives of the temple) was de- 
stroyed, there were others in private hands, from whence 
another public copy was afterwards transcribed, and deposited 
in the same place. 

It is probable, that after the dispersion of the Jews, upon 
the dissolution of their polity, the genealogical tables came to 
be neglected, and so gradually perished. Some imagine, that 
their frequent intermarriages with the people of the countries 
into which they were dispersed, made them designedly dis- 
continue them ; that the corrupt mixture and debasement of 
their blood might not appear. However that be, it is certain 
they have long since been lost. 

From hence an argument is formed by Christians, that the 
Messiah must be already come ; since, if he be not, it can 
never be proved, that he is of the tribe of Judah and family 
of David. 

But to this the Jews reply, that either Elias, or some other 
inspired priest or prophet, shall come, and restore their ge- 
nealogical tables before the Messiah's appearance ; — a tra- 
dition, which they ground on a passage in Nehemiah, chap, 
vii. 64, 65, to this effect : The genealogical register of the 
families of certain priests being lost, they were not able to 
make out their lineal descent from Aaron ; and therefore, 
" as polluted, were put from the priesthood the " Tirshatha 
said unto them, that they should not eat of the most holy 
things, till there stood up a priest with Urim and Thummim." 
From hence the Jews conclude, that such a priest will stand 



CHAP. HI.] PROSELYTES. 89 

up, and restore and complete the genealogies of their families : 
though others suppose these words to import, that they should 
never exercise their priesthood any more ; and that, " till there 
shall stand up a priest with Urim and Thummim," amounts 
to the same as the Roman proverb, ad Grczcas calendas, 
since the Urim and Thummim were now absolutely and for 
ever lost. 

The Proselytes. 

We now come to the proselytes ; who were not of the na- 
tural posterity of Abraham, but joined themselves to the peo- 
ple of Israel, and were, by the Greeks, styled npoatXvroi, airo 
tov 7rpocreXr]Xv^tvai, ab adventando et coeundo;* but by the 
"Hebrews, DVtf gcrim, peregrini, foreigners or inmates, in op- 
position to natives. Hence the son of a proselyte, by the 
father's side, was called "ti p ben gev ; the son of a proselyte 
by the mother's side, n*U p ben gerah ; and the son of both 
a he and she proselyte, by the artificial name JXO bagbag, 
which is composed of the initial letters of ben ger, and ben 
gerah. 

The Hebrews speak of two sorts of proselytes, the one called 
p"IJf gere tsedhek, proselyti justiticz ; the other D'Oi^in to- 
shabhim, inquilini, or iyw *>1Z gere shangnar, proselyti ported. 
The former became complete Jews, and were in all respect 
united to the Jewish church and nation ; the latter did not 
embrace the Jewish religion, yet were suffered to live among 
the Jews under certain restrictions. Nevertheless the former, 
as well as the latter, are sometimes distinguished from Jews, 
that is, from native Jews. Thus in the Acts, chap. xiii. 43, 
we read of the Jews, and religious proselytes, at Antioch in 
Pisidia ; who must have been proselytes of righteousness, be- 
cause none were called proselytes of the gate (if any such 
there were), who did not dwell in the land of Israel. 

As for the proselytes of righteousness, the Scripture gives 
us no other account of the manner of their admission into the 
Jewish church, but by the rite of circumcision. In the book 
of Exodus, amongst the regulations concerning the passover, 

* Philo. Jud. lib. i.; de Monarch, apud Opera, p. 631, edit. Colon. 
Allobr. 1613. 



90 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



this is one, " When a stranger will sojourn with thee, and 
will keep the passover to the Lord, let all his males be cir- 
cumcised, and then let him come near and keep it ; and he 
shall be as one that is born in the land;" chap.xii.48. Where 
these two things are farther observable : 

1st. That when a man thus became a proselyte, all his males 
were to be circumcised as well as himself ; whereby his chil- 
dren were admitted into the visible church of God, in his right, 
as their father. 

2dly. That upon this he should be entitled to all the privi- 
leges and immunities of the Jewish church and nation, as well 
as be subject to the whole law : he should be as one " born in 
the land." 

To this brief account which the Scripture gives us of the ad- 
mission of proselytes, the rabbies add a much larger one, of the 
preparation for their admission, of the form of their admission, 
and of the consequences and effects of it. 

First, The preparation for the admission of proselytes con- 
sisted, according to them, of three articles : 

1st. An examination : 

2dly. Instruction: 

3dly. Their making a profession of their faith, and of their 
obedience to the Jewish law. 

1st. The person that offered himself to be a proselyte, was 
examined by three of the magistrates concerning the causes 
that moved him to it ; whether it was the love of any Jewish 
woman, the fear of any temporal punishment, the prospect of 
riches, or of any worldly advantage ; or whether it was a sin- 
cere love to God and his law? When he had given a satis- 
factory answer to these questions, he was then, 

2dly. Instructed in the Jewish religion, and particularly in 
the doctrine of rewards and punishments. And after this, 

3dly. He solemnly professed his assent to the doctrines 
which had been proposed to him, and promised to persevere in 
the faith and practice of the law of God till death. 

Secondly, As to the form and manner of admitting proselytes, 
the rabbies make it to consist of three articles, — circumcision, 
baptism, and sacrifice. 

1st. To the Scripture account of the requirement of circum- 
cision, in this case, they add, that though the proselyte was 



CHAP. HI.] 



PROSELYTES. 



91 



a Samaritan, or of any other nation who used that rite, some 
blood must, nevertheless, be drawn afresh from the part which 
had been circumcised. 

2dly. The proselyte, whether male or female, must be bap- 
tized by the immersion of the whole body into water; and 
this must be performed in a river, fountain, or pond, not in a 
vessel. 

Some ground this proselyte baptism on the instruction 
which Jacob gave to his f f household, and all that were with 
him," when they were to make a new consecration of them- 
selves to God, — " Put away the strange gods from amongst 
you, and be clean," Gen. xxxv. 2 ; where, by " being 
clean," they understand their being baptized, or their bodies 
being washed with water. They farther suppose, that the 
Israelites "being baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the 
sea," mentioned by St. Paul, 1 Cor. x. 2, means their entering 
into the Mosaic covenant by the rite of baptism ; and that 
when, therefore, in after ages, any became proselytes, or en- 
tered into this covenant, they also were baptized. 

Godwin seems to think John's baptism was of this sort. 
But, it is certain, that could not properly be proselyte bap- 
tism ; because he administered it to such as were Jews al- 
ready, and he had no commission to set up a new dispensa- 
tion, to which people should be admitted by this or any other 
rite. He only gave notice, that the kingdom of God, or the 
gospel dispensation, was at hand ; but it did not commence 
till after his death, namely, at our Saviour's resurrection : and 
proselyte baptism was a form of professing a new religion, at 
least new to the person professing it, and of his being ad- 
mitted a member of a church of which he was not one before. 
It was, therefore, I say, of a very different nature from John's 
baptism. His is rather to be considered as one of those 
" divers washings," in use among the Jews on many occasions ; 
for he did not attempt to make any alteration in the Jewish 
religion as settled by the Mosaic law, any more than to erect 
a new dispensation. And as these washings were intended, 
not only for " the purifying of the flesh," but to be signs and 
symbols of moral purity ; so the rite of baptism was, in this 
view, very suitable to the doctrine of repentance, which John 
preached. 



92 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



It is a farther supposition of Godwin's, that our Saviour 
converted this Jewish proselyte baptism into a Christian sa- 
crament. Upon this notion Dr. Wall* hath founded an argu- 
ment for baptizing children as well as adult persons ; because, 
when a parent was proselyted, all his children were baptized, 
as well as all his male children circumcised . But as baptism 
was administered, according to the Jewish doctors, only to 
the children born before his proselytism, not to any born after- 
wards, nor to his more distant posterity, who were esteemed 
holy branches, in virtue of springing from an holy root;*f 
some infer, that under the Christian dispensation baptism is 
only to be administered to converts from Judaism, Mahomet- 
anism, Paganism, or some other religion, and to their de- 
scendants born before their conversion and baptism, but to 
none born after. Mr. Emlyn, in particular, J insists upon this 
argument against the constant and universal obligation of 
infant baptism. 

But, after all, it remains to be proved, not only that 
Christian baptism was instituted in the room of proselyte 
baptism, but that the Jews had any such baptism in our Sa- 
viour's time. The earliest accounts we have of it are in the 
Mishna and Gemara ; § the former compiled, as the Jews 
assert, by Rabbi Juda, in the second century, though learned 
men in general bring it several centuries lower ; the latter, not 
till the seventh century. There is not a word of it in Philo ; 
nor yet in Josephus, though he gives an account of the pro- 

* See the Introduction to his History of Infant Baptism. 

f It was a maxim with the rabbies, " Natus baptizati habetur pro bapti- 
zato." This restriction of baptism to children born before their parents' 
proselytism, rests on the same authority as the custom of baptizing any 
children of proselytes, which appears from Dr. Wall. 

X Previous Question to several Questions about valid and invalid Baptism. 

§ The Mishna is a collection of the Jewish traditions and explanations 
of several passages of Scripture. The Gemara is a sort of glossary on the 
Mishna; and these together make up the Talmud. There are two Gemaras, 
that of Jerusalem and that of Babylon, the latter of which is most valued. 
The Jerusalem Gemara, Father Morin proves from the work itself, in which 
mention is made of the Turks, could not have been wrote till the time of 
Heraclius, about the year 620. The Gemara of Babylon was begun by 
one Asa, in the beginning of the seventh century, and on account of the 
wars between the Saracens and Persians, discontinued for seventy-three 
years, and then finished by one Josa. 



CHAP. III.] 



PROSELYTES. 



93 



selyting of the Idumeans by Hyrcanus. Indeed, on this 
occasion, he mentions only circumcision as the rite of initia- 
tion, and saith, that upon receiving this rite, and living ac- 
cording to the Jewish law, they from that time became Jews. # 
And notwithstanding he speaks of John's baptism, yet it is 
under a very different notion from the proselyte baptism 
spoken of by the mishnical rabbies. " This good man," saith 
he, " did Herod kill, who exhorted the virtuous, just, and 
pious, to come to his baptism; for he looked upon baptism to 
be acceptable to God, when used, not for purging away cer- 
tain offences, but for purifying the body, the soul having been 
before cleansed by righteousness. "f So that he makes John's 
baptism to be of the nature of the Jewish purifications, or 
ceremonial washings, without having any reference to prose- 
lyte baptism ; which, on this occasion, he could hardly have 
failed mentioning, if it had been then in use. 

It is alleged, however, in favour of its antiquity, that it is 
mentioned by Arrian, who lived A. D. 150; for, speaking of 
a philosopher's obligation to act agreeably to his character, he 
hath this illustration : " If we see any one change his profes- 
sion," or become a Jew, " we do not for that reason style him 
a Jew, but regard him as an hypocrite. Yet when he dis- 
covers the disposition and manners of one who is baptized, 
tov j3e|3a/xjU£vov, and enlisted in that sect, then he both is, 
and is called, a Jew. "J 

But to this it is replied, that nothing was more common 
than for the heathens to confound the Jews and Christians. 
Even Festus, who governed, for some time in Judea, seems 
to have taken the Christians only for a sect of the Jews ; Acts 
xxv. 19, 20. Suetonius speaks of an insurrection made by 
the Jews, " impulsore Chresto."§ And it is most likely that 
Arrian meant Christians in the place alleged, because in his 
time many persons became proselytes to Christianity, but few 
or none to Judaism, the Jews, who were scattered amongst 
all nations, being every where oppressed and despised. Be- 

* Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. ix. sect. i. torn. i. p. 659, edit. Haverc. 
t Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. v. sect. ii. torn. i. p. 883, 884, edit. Haverc. 
I Comment, in Epictet. lib. ii. cap. ix. p. 192, edit. Cantab. 1655. 
§ Sueton. in vit. Claudii, cap. xxv. sect, xii.; et Annot. in loc. torn. ii. 
p, 87, edit. Pitisci. 



94 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



sides, if he had spoken of proselytes to Judaism, it is highly 
probable he would have mentioned their circumcision, for 
which the heathens derided them, rather than their baptism, 
which was not so very foreign to some of the heathen rites of 
purification. 

Upon the whole, it is more likely the Jews took the hint of 
proselyte baptism from the Christians, after our Saviour's 
time, than that he borrowed his baptism from theirs; which, 
whenever it came into practice, was one of those additions to 
the law of God, which he severely censures ; Matt. xv. 9. 
To this it is probable Justin Martyr refers, in his dialogue 
with Trypho, when, among the Jewish heresies or sects, he 
mentions that of the /3a7n-to-Tcn, baptizers.* From hence it 
should seem, that in his time, about the middle of the second 
century, proselyte baptism was a novel practice, and had not 
yet universally prevailed. 

However that be, there wants more evidence of its being 
as ancient as our Saviour's time than I apprehend can be pro- 
duced, to ground any argument upon it in relation to Chris- 
tian baptism. We, therefore, dismiss this form of the admis- 
sion of proselytes as uncertain. f 

3dly. The rabbies tell us, the proselyte was to offer a 
sacrifice on occasion of his admission, in the presence of three 
witnesses, not mean, but respectable and honourable persons. 

Thus much concerning the form and manner of admitting 
proselytes. 

Thirdly. We are to consider the effects and consequences 
of being made a proselyte. 

1st. The proselyte was now considered as born again. It 
was a saying among the Jews, that "when a man is made a 
proselyte, he is like a new-born infant," and " he hath a new 
soul." This is supposed to throw some light on our Saviour's 
reproof to Nicodemus, " Art thou a master in Israel, and 
knowest not these things?" John iii. 10 ; that is, what being 
"born again" means? For, it seems, Mcodemus, apprehend- 
ing a Jew was never to be a proselyte to any other religion, 

* Apud Opera, p. 307, A. edit. Paris, 1615. 

f On the subject of proselyte baptism, see Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. ad 
Matt. iii. 6, and Harm, ad Joh. iii. 23. Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent, 
lib. ii. cap. ii. ; particularly Wall's Introduction to his History of Infant 
Baptism, and Gale's Reflections on Wall, lett. ix. x. 



CHAP. III.] PROSELYTES. 95 

did not know how to understand it otherwise than of " enter- 
ing a second time into the womb, and being born," ver. 4. 
Whereas he, who was a master in Israel, and probably a 
member of the great council or Sanhedrim, might have been 
expected to comprehend the force of our Lord's phraseology 
from the common use of the like expressions concerning those 
who became proselytes. # 

2dly. The bond of natural relation, betwixt the proselyte 
and all his kindred, was now dissolved. Wherefore it was a 
maxim with the rabbies, that a proselyte might lawfully marry 
his own mother, or his own daughter, born before he became 
a proselyte, they being now no more related to him than any 
other women : though such marriages were looked upon as 
indecent, and on that account not permitted. f Some have 
supposed our Saviour refers to the proselyte's renunciation of 
his natural relations when he saith, " If any man come unto 
me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and chil- 
dren, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he 
cannot be my disciple Luke xiv. 26. And that the same is 
alluded to in the following passage of the Psalmist : " Hearken, 
O daughter, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own 
people and thy father's house ;" Psalm xlv. 10. Tacitus, in 
his character of the Jews, having mentioned their custom of 
circumcision, as adopted by proselytes, adds, "They then 
quickly learn to despise the gods, to renounce their country, 
and to hold their parents, children, and brethren, in the ut- 
most contempt. "J And very probably this unnatural con- 
tempt, which the Jewish doctors taught proselytes to entertain 
of their nearest relations, might be one thing on account of 
which they are said to have " made them twofold more the 
children of hell than themselves ;" Matt, xxiii. 15. 

3dly. The proselyte was now to all intents and purposes a 
Jew,§ and entitled to a share in the privileges and blessings 

* See Lightfoot, Horae Heb. in loc. 

f Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. ad Joh. iii. 3, and Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent, 
lib. v. cap. xviii. 

J Tacit. Histor. lib. v. cap. v. 

§ Consult Numb. xv. 15, Esth. viii. 17, and Josephus, in the place 
above cited concerning the Idumeans, where he saith, that being circum- 
cised and living according to the law of Moses, they were from that time 
Jews, to \oi7rov lovdaiov. 



96 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



of such. He was to be treated with the utmost respect and 
kindness : # no native Jew might upbraid him with his former 
idolatry and wickedness. Yet it is certain the Jews were in 
general apt to look with a very evil eye upon proselytes, espe- 
cially on those who had been Samaritans ; for they thought 
themselves allowed to hate Samaritans, even though they be- 
came proselytes, because their ancestors obstructed the re- 
building the temple and the holy city ; and for this they would 
never forgive them, though by admitting them as proselytes 
they declared their faith and hope that God had forgiven them. 

According to the rabbies, proselytes were excluded from 
many civil advantages, or privileges of the commonwealth, to 
which Israelites by descent were entitled .f Certain it is, the 
law made a difference between one nation and another, as to 
what is called "entering into the congregation of the Lord;" 
Deut. xxiii, beginning. Edomites and Egyptians had this 
privilege in the third generation, ver. 7, 8 ; though their im- 
mediate children were excluded, their grandchildren were 
admitted. An Ammonite or Moabite was excluded even " to 
the tenth generation," saith the law, or, as it is added, "for 
ever;" which the Jews take to be explanatory of the tenth 
generation, ver. 3. The law was certainly thus understood 
in Nehemiah's time : " On that day they read in the book of 
Moses in the audience of the people ; and therein was found 
written, that the Ammonite and the Moabite should not enter 
into the congregation of God for ever, &c; and it came to 
pass, when they had heard the law, that they separated from 
Israel all the mixed multitude ;" Nehem. xiii. 1 — 3. Bas- 
tards were, likewise, under the same exclusion to the tenth 
generation, though not for ever ; Deut. xxiii. 2. 

It is not certain what is meant by not " entering into the 
congregation of the Lord." It cannot be, as Ainsworth rightly 
observes,^ not adopting the faith and religion of Israel, and 
entering into the church in that respect ; because it was law- 

* See a remarkable passage in Philo, lib. i. de Monarchia, apud Opera, 
p. 631, 632, F. G. A. edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. 

f Vid. Selden, de Jure Naturae et Gent. lib. ii. cap. iv. Oper. torn. i. 
p. 194 — 196 ; et de Scynedr. lib. ii. cap. viii. torn. ii. p. 1396, et seq. edit, 
Lond. 1726. 

J In loc. 



C HAP, III.] 



PROSELYTES. 



97 



ful for all so to do ; Exod. xii. 48, 49. The Hebrew doctors 
generally understand by it, a prohibition of the Israelites mar- 
rying with such persons as are here excluded. * To this it is 
objected, that " he who is wounded in gemtalibus, cui sunt 
attriti vel amputati testes, or who is totally castrated, cui 
abscissum est veretrum, is, likewise, excluded," ver. 1. Now, 
say they, it would be superfluous to forbid women to marry 
with such persons, because it cannot be supposed they would. 
It may nevertheless be replied, though such a prohibition might 
probably be needless, when this their defect was known, it 
might be requisite to forbid such persons marrying, when it 
was secret, as they might be inclined to do for several politic 
reasons. Dr. Patrick, therefore, understands by the mixed 
multitude, which in the forecited passage of Nehemiah we are 
told, was separated from Israel by this law, such as were born 
of strangers, who were not allowed to partake of the rites of 
marriage with Israelites. 

But the opinion concerning entering into the congregation, 
most commonly received among Christian writers, is, that it 
• signifies being permitted to bear any office in the Jewish com- 
monwealth. And it is certain, saith Dr. Patrick, the Hebrew 
word bnp kahal, which we render congregation, does in many 
places signify, not the whole body of the people of Israel, but 
the great assembly of elders. Those who prefer this sense, 
assign as a reason why eunuchs of all sorts were excluded as 
well as strangers, that they are generally observed to want 
courage, and are therefore unfit for government.. 

We proceed now to the other sort of proselytes, whom the 
Jewish doctors style Ijfltf vu gere shanguar, " strangers of the 
gate," from an expression which several times occurs in the 
Mosaic law, "The stranger that is within thy gate," see 
Deut. xiv. 21. Or otherwise they are called 2t2rtJn gere 
toshabh. Thus in Leviticus we read of " strangers that so- 
journed" among the Israelites, Dvun DOttttnn hattoshabim 
haggarim, Lev. xxv. 45. These were foreigners, who did not 
embrace the Jewish religion (and are, therefore, improperly 
called proselytes), yet " were suffered to live among the Jews," 
under certain restrictions. As, 

1st. That they should not practise idolatry, nor worship 

* Vid. Selden. de Jure Nature et Gent. lib. v. cap. xvi. Opera, torn, i. p. 576, 

H 



98 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



any other god beside the God of Israel ; which, under the 
Theocracy, was crimen l&sa majestatis, and therefore not to 
be tolerated : " He that sacrificeth unto any god, save the 
Lord, he shall utterly be destroyed Exod. xxii. 20. 

2dly. That they should not blaspheme the God of Israel : 
" He that blasphemeth the name of the Lord shall surely be 
put to death ; as well the stranger as he that is born in the 
land;" Lev. xxiv. 16. And perhaps also, 

3dly. That they should keep the Jewish sabbath ; so far at 
least as to refrain from working on that day. For in the 
fourth commandment the obligation of observing the sabba- 
tical rest is expressly extended to the " stranger that was 
within their gates Exod. xx. 10. 

So long as they lived under these restrictions in a peaceable 
manner, the Israelites were forbid to " vex or oppress them;" 
Exod. xxii. 21. Nevertheless they might buy slaves out of 
their families, as well as of the heathen that were round 
about them ; Lev. xxv. 44, 45. But of their brethren, the 
Israelites, they were forbid to make slaves, ver. 39, 40. It 
was lawful to lend upon usury to these strangers, though it 
was not to an Israelite; Deut. xxiii. 20. They might eat 
that which died of itself, which was prohibited to an Israelite; 
Deut. xiv. 21. By the stranger, therefore, who was forbidden 
to " eat blood and that which died of itself,'' Lev. xvii. 12. 15, 
we must necessarily understand a proselyte of righteousness. 
And such also, the Jewish doctors say, is the stranger men- 
tioned in the fourth commandment, who was obliged to keep 
the sabbath ; it being, in their apprehension, unlawful for any 
uncircumcised person to observe the law of Moses, because 
it was given peculiarly to Israel : " Moses commanded us a 
law, even the inheritance of the congregation of Jacob ;" 
Deut. xxxiii. 4: in particular the law concerning the sabbath : 
" Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to 
observe the sabbath throughout their generations for a per- 
petual covenant. It is a sign betwixt me and the children of 
Israel for ever;" Exod. xxxi. 16, 17. But in concluding 
from hence, that none except native Israelites, and such as 
had joined themselves to their church, were obliged by the 
law of the sabbath, they seem to forget, that it was given to 
Adam, and consequently to all mankind ; Gen. ii. 3. There 



CHAP. III.] 



PROSELYTES. 



99 



is no impropriety, therefore, in supposing, that these uncir- 
cumcised strangers were comprehended in the fourth com- 
mandment. Besides, it seems reasonable, that they should be 
obliged to rest on the Jewish sabbath, lest their working or 
recreations should disturb and hinder the devotion of the 
Israelites. 

These strangers were, moreover, permitted to worship the 
God of Israel in the outer court of the temple; which for 
that reason was called " the court of the Gentiles;" to which 
there is a reference in the charge given to the angel in the 
book of the Revelation, to measure the temple of God, and the 
altar, and them that worship therein ; but the court which is 
without the temple, to leave out, and measure it not; because 
it is given to the Gentiles; Rev. xi. 2. Betwixt this and the 
inner court, where the Israelites assembled, there was a wall, 
to which the apostle Paul alludes; " For he is our peace, 
who hath made both (Jews and Gentiles) one, and hath 
broken down the middle wall of partition between us;" Eph. 
ii. 14. For such worshippers as these strangers, and for their 
acceptance with God, Solomon prayed at the dedication of 
the temple : " Moreover, concerning as tranger, that is not of 
thy people Israel, but cometh out of a far country, for thy 
name's sake (for they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy 
strong hand, and of thy stretched-out arm), when he shall come 
and pray toward this house, hear thou in heaven thy dwell- 
ing place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to 
thee for ; that all the people of the earth may know thy name 
to fear thee, as do thy people Israel;" 1 Kings viii. 41 — 43. 

The numbers of these strangers, who dwelt among the 
Israelites, were very considerable ; we find no less than one 
hundred fifty-three thousand six hundred of them, in Solo- 
mon's time, employed in servile labour, 2 Chron. ii. 17, 18. 

This is the sum of what can be gathered from Scripture 
concerning the "ijfly gere shangnar, or 3ltfm toshabh. 

But the talmudical rabbies have made proselytes of all these 
strangers and sojourners, * at least, of all who were in the 
land of Israel when the Jews were their own masters, and 
not in subjection to any foreign power; for they confess, in 
that case, there was no preventing heathens dwelling among 
* Vid. Selden. de Jure Naturae et Gent. lib. ii. cap. iii. 
H 2 



100 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



them, even though they refused to submit to the restrictions 
of the law; they say, therefore, there were no proselytes of the 
gate in such times : but that at other times no Gentile was 
permitted to dwell in the land of Israel, without being a pro- 
selyte of the gate ; that is, without submitting to, and obeying 
the seven precepts, which the rabbies pretend God gave to 
Noah and his sons, and which, according to them, comprised 
the law of nature, common to all mankind. 

These have been usually styled the septem, pnecepta Nod- 
chidarum;* by which they were required to abstain from 
idolatry, from blasphemy, from murder, from adultery, from 
theft: to institute judges to maintain the laws; and not to 
eat the flesh of any animal, cut off while it was alive. 

Maimonides saith, the first six precepts were given to 
Adam, and the seventh to Noah.-f- 

But what creates a suspicion, that this is all invention of 
the talmudists, is, that there is no mention of these seven 
precepts being given to the Noachidoe, in Scripture, in Onke- 
los, in Josephus, or in Philo; and that neither Jerome, nor 
Origen, nor any of the ancient fathers, appear to have been 
in the least acquainted with them. 

However, something like the seventh was undoubtedly 
given to Noah and his posterity: " The flesh with the life 
thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat;" Gen. 
ix. 4. Under this restriction, they had, presently after the 
flood, permission to eat all sorts of animal food: " Every 
moving thing, that liveth, shall be meat for you ; even as the 
green herb have I given you all things," ver. 3. From 
whence it has been generally concluded, that the antediluvians 
used only vegetables ; which seems, indeed, to be the only 
kind of food God allotted for man at his creation ; Gen. i. 29, 
30. Nevertheless, immediately after the flood, the permission 
is extended to " every moving thing that liveth;" that is, to 
all kind of animals that are fit for food, without any such dis- 
tinction between clean and unclean as was afterward made 
under the Jewish law. 

Some have, indeed, maintained the contrary opinion ; sup- 

* Vid. Selden. de Jure Naturae et Gent. lib. i. cap. x.; et Shickard. de 
Jure Regio, cum Notis Carpzov. p. 333, et seq. 

f De Regibus, cap. ix. ab init. apud Crenii Fascicul. nonum. p. 133. 



CHAP. III.] 



PROSELYTES. 



101 



posing, that the use of animal food was included in the ge- 
neral grant of power and dominion which God gave to 
Adam over the brute creation ; Gen. i. 26 — 28. 

The chief arguments to prove that animal food was not 
used before the deluge are,* 

1st. That God's grant of the use of his creatures for food 
to Adam, is expressly restrained to the vegetable creation. 

2dly. The scripture history is wholly silent concerning the 
use of animal food before the flood. 

3dly. If animal food had been then permitted, there could 
have been no reason for this new grant which God gave to 
Noah. 

The chief arguments, alleged on the other side, are taken, 
1st. From the history of Abel's sacrifice ; which is said to 
have consisted of the " firstlings of his flock, and the fat 
thereof ;" Gen. iv. 4. Now, it having never been usual to 
offer any thing in sacrifice to God, but what was useful to 
man, it is concluded from this account, that animals were 
at that time used for food. Nevertheless, this will not fol- 
low, because Abel's flock might be kept for the sake of the 
milk and wool, which render these creatures exceedingly ser- 
viceable. 

It must be owned, that the particular mention of the fat, 
in the account of this sacrifice, might incline one to think it 
was a peace-offering ; the fat of which was consumed upon 
the altar, and the flesh eat by the person at whose charge the 
offering was made, and by the priests : Lev. iii. per totum ; 
chap. vii. 15. 33. But the affix of the word chelbehen, 
which we translate " the fat thereof," should rather be ren- 
dered, " of them namely, of the firstlings of his flock ; inti- 
mating-, not that he offered the fat of the animal, but the 
fattest or best amongst them. The word chelebh is often 
used for the best of its kind, whatever be the thing spoken 
of. Thus nDn 2/n chelebh chittah is well rendered " the 
finest of the wheat:'' Psalm lxxxi. 16; cxlvii. 14. The fat 
of the oil and the fat of the wine, mean the best of their 
kind, as our translators have rendered it; Numb, xviii. 12. 
The *' fat of the land," means the best of its produce ; Gen. 
xlv. 18. Thus it seems most natural to understand the word 
* On this debate consult Heidegger. Histor. Patriarch, torn. i. exercit. xv. 



102 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Dbn chelebh, in the present case ; importing that Abel brought 
the best of his flock for an offering to the Lord : this we sup- 
pose was a whole burnt-offering, or sacrifice of atonement ; 
which, according to the law afterward given to Moses, was 
entirely consumed on the altar, except the skin, which was 
the priest's fee, for killing and offering it; Lev. vii. 8. 

There were many other sorts of sacrifices afterward ap- 
pointed by the law of Moses, which had a political, as well 
as religious use, as we showed in a former lecture. But the 
design of the whole burnt-offering was entirely religious, to 
impress the conscience with a sense of the deserved punish- 
ment of sin, and to typify the great atonement which Christ, 
in due time, was to offer. There was the same reason, there- 
fore, for these sacrifices before the time of Moses, as there 
was afterwards ; and it is probable, that they were instituted 
presently after the fall, and that of the skins of the animals 
slain for sacrifice, God made those garments for Adam and 
Eve, which are spoken of in the third chapter of Genesis, 
ver. 21 ; that is, directed them to make them ; as Jacob is 
said to have made his son Joseph a coat of many colours, 
Gen. xxxvii. 3, or ordered it to be made. 

Upon the whole, the history of Abel's sacrifice affords no 
proof of men's eating animal food before the flood. We pro- 
ceed, therefore, 

2dly. To another argument in favour of this opinion, built 
upon the distinction of the creatures into clean and unclean, 
before Noah entered into the ark ; Gen. vii. 2. Now it is 
alleged, that we cannot conceive of any cleanness or unclean- 
ness in those animals themselves ; but merely as some are 
more fit for food than others, or as God is pleased to permit 
the use of some, and not of others ; and therefore it is said, 
this distinction of them before the flood must imply, that 
animal food was used at that time. 

To this it has been replied by some, that the distinction is 
used by Moses, in his history of those early times, prolepti- 
cally. Cyrenius is called governor of Syria by St. Luke, in 
relating what he did at the time of our Saviour's birth, though 
he was not made governor of Syria till several years after. 
So, we may suppose Moses, in his history of the deluge, 
ranges the animals that went into the ark, into clean and 



CHAP. III.] PROSELYTES. 103 

unclean, according to the distinction afterward made betwixt 
them by the law, and well known when he wrote. This 
answer, perhaps, hath too much the air of a subterfuge to be 
perfectly satisfactory. 

Suppose then we make this reply, that the terms " clean 
and unclean" do not here respect the distinction afterward 
made by the Jewish law; but a natural difference, which may 
be observed in most of the creatures that God allowed or 
forbid to be eat by the Jews. The clean have no upper cut- 
ting teeth, their fat hardens into suet, they rise up with their 
liind feet first; in all which respects they are the reverse of 
the unclean. Such a distinction, therefore, men would na- 
turally make, not only when animal food came to be used, 
but probably before. 

However, suppose it should respect the use of them for 
food, it will not follow, because God commanded above three 
times as many more of the clean creatures, than of the un- 
clean, to be preserved in the ark, that men used them for 
food before the flood. It seems more probable, that this 
distinction was now first made, and a greater number of those 
which were most fit for food preserved, merely because God 
intended to permit the use of them in a very short time. 

There is another question on this head, which should be a 
little considered before we dismiss the subject: For what 
reason were the antediluvians not allowed to make use of ani- 
mal food, as well as Noah and his posterity after the flood ? 

The more commonly received opinion is, that it was to pre- 
serve their lives, that the world might be speedily replenished 
with inhabitants; because the free use of flesh would impair 
their constitution, and shorten their days. Their longevity is 
accordingly imputed to their sobriety, and the simplicity of 
their diet, and in particular to their living only on vegetables. 
But this would make God's grant of animal food to Noah a 
curse instead of a blessing. Besides, it is not certain, that 
the moderate use of it is at all prejudicial to health. If it 
were, why hath God formed us with teeth so peculiarly 
adapted to the mastication of it, and with a stomach suited to 
digest it? Beverovicius, a learned physician,* is so far from 
being convinced, that eating flesh is unsalutary, and tends to 

* Vid. ejus Thesaurum Sanitatis. lib. iii. et apud Heidegger. Histor. Pa- 
triarch, torn. i. exer. xiv. de eorum long. sect, xx. 



104 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[LOOK 1. 



shorten men's lives, that, among several causes of the longevity 
of the antediluvians, one, which he assigns, is their eating raw 
flesh; the best and most nourishing parts of which he sup- 
poses to be carried off in dressing by the action of the fire. 
But though there is great reason to conclude the antedilu- 
vians eat no flesh, I can see no good reason to impute their 
longevity to abstaining from it, or to believe, that it was for 
the sake of their health God did not allow them to use it. 

I shall take the liberty myself to offer a conjecture. Sup- 
posing the lives of animals were no longer before the flood, 
and consequently their increase no greater than at present,* 
while the lives of men were ten times as long, and their in- 
crease consequently ten times greater; there was then an 
evident reason why animal food was not permitted, from the 
insufficient number of animals ; insomuch that the use of them 
would, probably, in a few years have destroyed the whole 
species. For now men's lives are shortened, and their in- 
crease ten times less, there is only such a proportion betwixt 
the human and brutal species, as ordinarily prevents the want 
of animal food, without overstocking us. Divine wisdom, 
therefore, did not make this grant till it thought fit to contract 
the life of man; which was immediately after the deluge. 

Godwin, who relies on the authority of the talmudical rabbies 
for his account of the proselytes of the gate, produces out of 
the Scripture history four instances of such proselytes : Naa- 
man the Syrian, 2 Kings v.; Cornelius the Roman centurion, 
Acts x. ; the Ethiopian eunuch, Acts viii. 27 ; and those devout 
men, avdpeg evXafitig, " out of every nation under heaven," 
who are said to be dwelling at Jerusalem, Acts ii. 5. But 
none of these are sufficient to support the rabbinical account 
of such proselytes. 

1st. As for Naaman, who was by birth a Syrian, and gene- 
ral of king Benhadad's army, he appears to have been a Gen- 
tile idolater. But being miraculously cured of his leprosy by 
the power of the God of Israel, and the direction of his prophet 
Elisha, he renounced his idolatry, acknowledged this God to be 
the only true God, 2 Kings v. 15, — " Behold, now I know, that 
there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel/' — and promised, 
for the time to come, that he would worship none other but 
Jehovah; ver. 17. He also requested the prophet, that he 
might have two mules' load of earth to carry home with him 



CHAP. III.] 



PROSELYTES. 



105 



from the land of Israel, most probably intending to build an 
altar with it in his own country ; as seems indeed to be im- 
plied in the reason with which he enforces his request — " Shall 
there not, I pray thee, be given to thy servant two mules' 
burden of earth : for thy servant will henceforth offer neither 
burnt-offering nor sacrifice to other gods, but unto Jehovah/' 
ubi supra. This request seems to have been partly founded 
on a superstitious opinion he had conceived of some peculiar 
holiness and virtue in the earth of the country ; so that he 
supposed an altar built of it would be more pleasing, and ren- 
der his sacrifice more acceptable, to God, than if it were made 
of any other materials. Perhaps he had formed this notion 
upon finding such a miraculous virtue in the water of Jordan, 
that barely washing in it had effected his cure ; and he con- 
cluded, therefore, the earth must have likewise some extra- 
ordinary virtue. Yet he did not conceive this was owing to 
any thing peculiar in the nature of that water and that earth ; 
but that God had miraculously infused into them this virtue ; 
and he thought it, therefore, best to worship him at an altar 
of that earth which he had peculiarly sanctified. 

Or, it may be, by this symbol of an altar built of the earth 
of the land of Israel, he meant to signify his communion with 
that people in the worship of the true God. 

He further desired this earth might be given him by the 
prophet, probably supposing his consent and his blessing upon 
it would render it more efficacious for the acceptableness of his 
sacrifice, than if he had taken it without his permission. 

He further says, "In this the Lord pardon thy servant, that 
when my master goes into the house of Rimmon, to worship 
there, and he leaneth upon my hand, and I bow myself in the 
house of Rimmon ; when I bow down in the house of Rim- 
mon, the Lord pardon thy servant in this thing/' ver. 18: 
which some understand to be a reserve, denoting he would 
renounce idolatry no farther than was consistent with his 
worldly interest, with his prince's favour, and his place at 
court. But if so, the prophet would hardly have dismissed 
him with a blessing, saying, "Go in peace ;" ver. 19. 

Others therefore suppose, that in these words he begs par- 
don for what he had done in times past, not for what he should 
continue to do. 



106 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



(book I; 



They observe, that ^lnnttfn hishtachvethi, though rendered 
in the future tense by the Targum, and by all the ancient 
versions, is really the preterperfect ; and they, therefore, un- 
derstand it, " when I have bowed myself," or " because I 
have bowed myself" in the house of Rimmon, the Lord pardon 
thy servant. With this sense Dr. Lightfoot agrees,* and it 
is defended by the learned Bochart in a large dissertation on 
the case of Naaman. Yet to me it does not seem very 
probable, that, if he meant this for a penitential acknow- 
ledgment of his former idolatry, he should only mention what 
he had done as the king's servant, and not his own voluntary 
worshipping the idol. 

The more probable opinion, therefore, is, that he consulted 
the prophet, whether it was lawful for him, having renounced 
idolatry and publicly professed the worship of the true God, 
still, in virtue of his office, to attend his master in the temple 
of Rimmon, in order that he might lean upon him, either out 
of state, or perhaps out of bodily weakness ; because if he 
attended him, as he had formerly done, he could not avoid 
bowing down, when he did. To this the prophet returns no 
direct answer; lest, if on the one hand he had declared it 
unlawful, he should have too much discouraged this new con- 
vert, before he was well established in the true religion ; or 
if, on the other, he had declared it lawful, he should seem to 
give countenance to idolatry. He, therefore, made no other 
reply, but*' Go in peace." 

After this we have no further mention of Naaman. But 
in the following account of the wars betwixt Syria and Israel, 
Benhadad seems to have commanded his army in person : 
from whence Mr. Bedford f infers, that Naaman was dis- 
missed from the command, for refusing to worship Rimmon. 
But the premises are not sufficient to support the conclusion ; 
for it appears that Benhadad had commanded his army in 
person twice before ; once in the siege of Samaria, 1 Kings 
xx. 1, and once at Aphek, ver. 26. Yet from the total silence 
concerning Naaman it is probably enough conjectured, that 
he either died, or resigned, or was dismissed, soon after his 
return. 

* Vid. Hor. Hebr. in Luke iv. 27. 

f See his Scripture Chronology, p. 627, edit. Lond. 1730. 



CHAP. 111.] 



PROSELYTES. 



10? 



Well ! but though Naaman renounced idolatry, and became 
a worshipper of the true God ; yet he could not be a prose- 
lyte of the gate, according to the account the talmudists give 
of these proselytes, because he did not dwell in the land of 
Israel, but returned into Syria. If, therefore, he became a 
proselyte at all, it must have been a proselyte of the cove- 
nant ; though, perhaps, when he lived in another country, 
there was no need, in order to his being an acceptable wor- 
shipper of the true God, for his submitting to the whole Jew- 
ish law. We are rather, therefore, to account him a pious 
Gentile, than a Jewish proselyte. 

Tradition reports, that Gehazi, the prophet's servant, being 
struck with the leprosy, moved Naaman to erect a hospital 
for such unhappy persons at Damascus. Thevenot tells us, 
that there is such a hospital, richly endowed, just by the 
walls of that city, which owns Naaman for its founder.* 

It may not be amiss to observe from Dr. Patrick, that 
Naaman's was the only miraculous cure of the leprosy, re- 
corded in the Scripture history, till Christ the great prophet 
came into the world. And how beneficent a miracle it was, 
we may conclude from the account which Maundrell gives of 
that disease in those parts of the world. f He says, it differs 
much from that which is found amongst us ; it defiles the 
whole surface of the body with a foul scurf, deforms the joints, 
particularly at the wrists and ancles, which swell with a gouty 
scrofulous substance, very loathsome to look on. The legs of 
those that are affected with this distemper, look like an old 
battered horse's ; in short, it may pass for the utmost corrup- 
tion of the human body on this side the grave. 

The next Scripture instance of proselytes of the gate, men- 
tioned by Godwin, is Cornelius, the Roman centurion; whose 
character is, that he was " a devout man, and one that feared 
God with all his house, who gave alms to the people, and 
prayed to God always;" Acts x. 2. Yet it is evident, he was 
in no sense a Jewish proselyte, because, in the account of the 
Jews themselves, he was an unclean person, such a one as it 
was not lawful for them to keep company with. Nor would 

* See his Travels to the Levant, part ii. book i. chap. iv. 
f See his second Letter to Mr. Osborn, at the end of his Journey from 
Aleppo to Jerusalem, p. 150, 151, edit. 7. Oxford, 1749. 



108 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Peter have gone into his house, if he had not been instructed 
so to do by a special revelation ; which appears from the 
manner of his justifying this visit to Cornelius, so contrary 
to the received maxims of the Jews : " Ye know," saith he, 
" that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to 
keep company with, or come unto one of another nation ; 
but God has showed me that I should not call any man com- 
mon, or unclean ; therefore came I unto you without gain- 
saying, as soon as I was sent for ;" Acts x. 28, 29. The Jew- 
ish Christians at Jerusalem, likewise, blamed Peter for this 
visit: " Thou wentest," say they, " to men uncircumcised, and 
didst eat with them," chap. xi. 3; which shows, that they 
did not look upon him at all as a proselyte, for with such they 
might lawfully converse and eat. However, he was, indeed, 
of the character St. Peter mentions, one "who feared God, 
and wrought righteousness, and was accepted of him," chap, 
x. 35; notwithstanding, he was no way related to the Jews, 
except in the worship of the one true God. 

We may observe farther, that Cornelius could not be a 
proselyte of the gate, according to the talmudists' account, 
because the Jewish nation was at that time under the Roman 
yoke ; and in these circumstances, according to them, there 
could be no such proselytes. That he was not a proselyte of 
the covenant is plain, because he and his family and friends 
were the first fruits of the Gentiles. He was, therefore, in no 
sense a Jew, or a proselyte. 

As for the Ethiopian eunuch, whom Philip converted to 
the faith of Christ, and baptized, Acts viii. 26, et seq., he 
also is improperly reckoned among the proselytes of the gate, 
for the same reason that Naaman is, because he did not live 
in the land of Judea ; and for the same reason that Cornelius 
is, because the Jews were not then their own masters, but 
subject to a foreign power; for at such a time, the rabbies 
say, there could be no proselytes of the gate. 

He seems to have been rather a proselyte of the covenant, 
or completely a Jew : not only from his reading the Scripture, 
but because he had taken so long a journey to "worship at 
Jerusalem," ver. 27, at the feast of Pentecost ; one of the 
three grand festivals, when all the Jewish males, who were 
able, were, according to the law, to attend the worship of 



CHAP. III.] 



PROSELYTE 



109 



God at the national altar. He had taken, I say, a very- long 
journey; for his country was doubtless the Ethiopia in Africa, 
where, about that time, queen Candace reigned ; as we learn 
from Strabo,* and from Dion Cassius,f who informs us that 
Petronius, the prefect of Egypt, marched an army against 
Candace into Ethiopia, where he ravaged the country a con- 
siderable time, till the deep sands and excessive heats obliged 
him to return : which event was but about ten or eleven 
years before the affair here related of the eunuch. And 
Pliny, speaking of that country, saith, " there reigns Can- 
dace," " quod nomen multis jam annis ad reginas transiit/'J 
Probably this eunuch, who was treasurer of Ethiopia, had 
been made a proselyte by those Jews who spread themselves 
from Alexandria in Egypt into that country. But the pre- 
sent Ethiopians, or Abyssines, who are Christians of the Greek 
church, maintain that the Jewish religion was universally em- 
braced in their country, from the days of Solomon. It hath 
been a constant tradition among them, that the queen of 
Sheba, who went to visit him, was their empress ; that she 
had a son by him, named David ; who, as soon as he was 
of a proper age to undertake such a journey, was sent by her 
to Jerusalem, to receive his father's blessing, and to be in- 
structed in the law of Moses ; that being made thoroughly 
acquainted with the Jewish religion, he was sent home, with 
several priests and Levites to assist him in introducing it into 
Ethiopia ; and they were so successful in their mission, that 
in a few years it was embraced by the whole body of the 
people, and continued to be the public profession till the pro- 
mulgation of the gospel in that country. 

It is a tradition likewise among them, that the eunuch, 
baptized by Philip, was steward to their empress, and that, 
returning home, he converted his mistress and the whole em 
pire to the Christian faith. 

Though we cannot depend upon this latter story, yet it must 
be owned to have a far greater air of probability than the 
fable of the queen of Sheba and her son, and, indeed, than 

* Strabo, xvii. p. 820, edit Casaub. Paris, 1620. 
f Dion. lib. liv. sect. v. torn. i. p. 734, edit. Reimari. 
% Plin. Histor. Natural, lib. vi. cap. xxix. in fin. vol. i. p. 740, edit. Har- 
duin. Paris, 1685. 



110 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



most of the traditional stories of the first conversions of coun- 
tries. # 

The last instance which Godwin produces of proselytes of 
the gate, is, " The devout men, out of every nation under 
heaven, who dwelt at Jerusalem," and are mentioned in the 
Acts, chap. ii. 5. But these devout men are expressly said to 
be Jews ; that is, Jews by religion, not by nation ; for they be- 
longed to several nations. And though they are afterward 
distinguished into Jews and proselytes, ver. 10, that doubtless 
means such as were born of Jewish parents, though in a 
foreign country, and who had been brought up in their re- 
ligion ; or such as were born of Gentile parents, and had be- 
come proselytes to it. Besides, there is the same reason 
against acknowledging them to be proselytes of the gate, as 
there is against acknowledging Cornelius and the eunuch to 
be such ; namely, that the Jews were at that time subject to 
the Roman power. 

Upon the whole, there does not appear to be sufficient evi- 
dence in the Scripture history of the existence of such pro- 
selytes of the gate as the rabbies mention ; nor indeed of any 
who with propriety can be styled proselytes, except such as 
fully embraced the Jewish religion .f 

* Geddes's Church History of Ethiopia, p. 8. 

f Concerning the proselytes of the gate, vid. Maimon. de Regibus, cap. viii. 
sect. x. xi., et cap. ix. x., cum notis Leydecker, apud Crenii Fascicul. no- 
num, vel Leydeck. de Republ. Hebraeor. lib. vi. cap. vii. 

Concerning the proselytes of righteousness, vid. Maimon. de Vetito Con- 
cubitu, apud Leydecker, de Republics. Hebrseor. lib. vi. cap. vi. p. 364, et 
seq. Amstel. 1704, et Selden. de Jure Nat. et Gent. cap. ii. supra citat. et 
cap. iii. 



CHAPTER IV, 



OP THEIR KINGS. 

The alteration made in the form of the Hebrew constitution, 
which originally was a proper Theocracy, by setting up the 
regal government, hath been already considered. As it was 
plainly an act of rebellion against God to make any change 
in his original settlement, the Jews are therefore charged with 
" rejecting him, that he should not reign over them, when 
they desired to have a king to judge them like all the nations 
1 Sam. viii. 5, 6, 7. Nevertheless, as he permitted divorces, 
" because of the hardness of their hearts," Matt. xix. 8, in like 
manner, foreseeing the perverse disposition they would have, 
after their settlement in Canaan, to such an alteration, he was 
pleased to give them some rules beforehand, concerning their 
choice of a king, and the manner of his administration; Deut. 
xvii. 14, to the end. Some of the rabbies, in order to excul- 
pate their nation from the charge of rebellion on this occasion, 
would have this permission and regulation amount to an in- 
j unction to choose a king. Maimonides tells us, # out of the 
Babylonish Gemara,f that Moses gave the Israelites three 
express commandments, to elect a king, to destroy Amalek, 
and to build a temple, after they were possessed of the land 
of Canaan. He observes, that they accordingly chose Saul 
for their king, before they declared war against the Amalek- 
ites. But if this had been designed and understood as a 
command, they would no doubt have chosen a king presently 
after their settlement in Canaan, and not have delayed it for 
upwards of three hundred years. J We cannot suppose, but 

* De Regibus, cap. i. ab init. 

f Sanhedrin, cap. xxiii. in excerptis Cocceii, cap. xi. sect. vi. 

X Si petitio regis absolute, inquit Abarbanel, fuit legitima, et praeceptum 
legis, et non peccatum fuit, nisi in modo petendi, vel in fine, tempore, aut 
intentione ejus; quare Joshua et caeteri judices Israelis, ipsum secuti, nun- 



112 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Samuel would have put them upon choosing a king in obe- 
dience to the law of God, long before they desired one ; and 
not have blamed them, as he did, when they expressed that 
desire; 1 Sam. x. 19. Many of the rabbies are, therefore, of 
a contrary opinion ; # and so is Josephus, who imputes this 
desire of a kingly government^ to the intolerable corruption 
which had crept into all the courts of justice through the base- 
ness and avarice of Samuel's two sons.i And he introduces 
his account of the regulations in Deuteronomy concerning 
their kings, with observing, that they ought not to have ef- 
fected any other government, but to have loved the present, 
having the law for their master, and living according; to it, for 
it w T as sufficient that God was their ruler. § That their de- 
sire of a king was displeasing to God, seems also to be inti- 
mated in the prophecy of Hosea, " I gave thee a king in mine 
anger, and took him away in my wrath;" Hos. xiii. 11: re- 
ferring to Saul, the first king, on occasion of whose election 
God expressed his displeasure by terrible thunder; 1 Sam. xii. 
17, 18; and to Zedekiah, the last king, whom he suffered, 
together with his subjects, to be carried captive to Babylon. 
Maimonides, indeed, pretends that the sin, for which the peo- 
ple were reproved by Samuel, did not consist in their desiring 
a king, but in their coming to him in a tumultuous and disre- 
spectful manner, and asking a king, not in obedience to the 
divine command, but because they disdained his government. || 
This, however, is by no means agreeable to the Scripture ac- 
count, which evidently lays the blame on the desiring a king,*[ 
not on the manner in which that desire was expressed : '* The 

quain cogitarunt de rege in Israele constituendo, cum hoc ipsis prseceptum 
esset, quum ingrederentur terrain? Quomodo omnes transgressi sunt hoc 
praceptum, cum essent in terra post ejus occupationem et divisionem? 
Nullum hactenus interpretum vidi, qui de hoc egerit, et ad hoc aliquid re- 
spondent. Abarbanel, Dissert, ii. de Statu et Jure Regio, ad calcem Bux- 
torfii Dissertationum, p. 427, edit. Basil, 1662. 

* Vid. Abarbanel, ubi supra, p. 424, et seq. 

I Agreeably to 1 Sam. viii. 5. 

| Antiq. lib. vi. cap. iii. sect. iii. edit. Haverc. 

§ Lib. iv. cap. viii. sect. xvii. 

|| De Regibus, cap. i. sect. ii. 

51 In regardutione Samuelis, inquit Abarbanel, semper attribuitur pec- 
catum petitioni regis absolute, &c. Ubi supra, p. 427. 



LHAP. IV.] 



LAWS ABOUT KINGS. 



113 



thing displeased Samuel, when they said, Give us a king to 
judge us. And Samuel prayed unto the Lord. And the 
Lord said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people, 
in all that they say unto thee ; for they have not rejected thee, 
but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them f 
1 Sam. viii. 6, 7. The law, therefore, in the seventeenth 
chapter of Deuteronomy, must be looked upon, not as a com- 
mand, nor hardlv as a permission, to choose a king;* for if 
they had supposed it to amount even to a permission, no 
doubt they would have alleged it to Samuel ; nor is it easy to 
see how " their wickedness would then have been so great in 
asking a king," as it is represented to be. It must be con- 
sidered, therefore, rather as a restraining law, that in case 
they would have a king, it should be under such limitations 
as God then prescribed, which are the eight following : — 

1st. That the choice of the person to be their king God 
would reserve to himself. They must not say, f£ I will set a 
king over me, like as all the nations that are about me; 
but thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the 
Lord thy God shall choose ;" Deut. xvii. 14, 15. Accordingly 
he appointed Saul, by lot, to be their first king, 1 Sam. x. 21 ; 
and David, by name, to be their second king; 1 Sam. xvi. 12. 
He likewise chose Solomon to be David's successor, 1 Chron. 
xxviii. 5; and, after him, he made the kingly government 
hereditary in David's family; 1 Kings ii. 4. Nevertheless, 
this divine choice and appointment only restrained the people 
from making any other person king than him whom God had 
nominated ; but it did not actually invest him with the regal 
authority ; that was done by an act of the people .f Thus, after 
God had appointed David to be king, in token of which he 
had been anointed by Samuel, 1 Sam. xvi. 13; yet the men 
of Judah anointed him king over the house of Judah, whereby 
they declared their concurrence, and acceptance of him for 
their king; 2 Sam. ii. 4. And upon the death of Solomon, 

* Abarbanel makes several judicious observations, to show it was no 
command, in his Dissertation above quoted, p. 436, et seq. 

t Per " ponere regem," inquit Abarbanel, intelligitur ejus constitutio 
per populum; sed electio divina facta fuit per prophetam, riediante 
unctione. Abarbanel, Dissert, iii. p. 451, ad calcem Buxtorf. Dissert. Phi- 
lolog. Theolog. edit. Basil, 1662. 

I 



114 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I , 



though the crown was then hereditary, " all Israel came to 
Shechem to make his son Rehoboam kino ;" 1 Kings xii. 1. 

2dly. The king must be a native Israelite, not a Heathen, 
nor a Proselyte. " One from among thy brethren shalt thou 
set over thee ; thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, who 
is not thy brother;" Deut. xvii. 14, 15. It may naturally be 
inquired, what occasion was there for this limitation, when 
God had reserved the choice of the person to himself. I 
answer, more effectually to unite the people against any foreign 
invader, and any one who might attempt to seize the crown. 
The Mishna relates,* that when king Agrippa, an Idumean 
proselyte, met with this text, as he was reading in public, he 
burst into tears, because he was not of the seed of Israel. 
The people, however, encouraged him, crying out, "Fear not, 
Agrippa, thou art our brother;" probably because the children 
of Esau, from whom the Idumeans are descended, are called in 
Deuteronomy the brethren of the Jews ; Deut. ii. 4. 

3dly. The king was not to multiply horses ; and is par- 
ticularly forbid, therefore, sending to Egypt for them. Deut. 
xvii. 16, where was the chief breed of those animals in that 
part of the world. The Egyptian cavalry, which invaded 
Judea in the reign of Rehoboam, consisted of twelve hundred 
chariots, and sixty thousand horsemen; 2Chron. xii. 2, 3. 
The reason of the king's being prohibited to multiply horses 
hath been commonly thought to be, to restrain him from affect- 
ing unnecessary pomp, expensive to himself, and burdensome 
to his people. If so, Solomon was egregiously guilty of trans- 
gressing this law, who had horses brought out of Egypt. 
1 Kings x. 28 ; and, according to the account in the First Book 
of Kings, had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, 
and twelve thousand horsemen, 1 Kings iv. 26 ; or, according 
to the lower account in Chronicles, four thousand stalls for 
horses and chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen, 2 Chron. 
ix. 25. Perhaps these two accounts are best reconciled, by 
allowing ten horses to each stall, mentioned in Chronicles. 
Or, the word signifying either stable or stall, in Chronicles it 
may mean the former, in Kings, the latter .f 

* Mish. in Sota, sive de uxore adulterii suspecta, cap. vii. sect. viii. edit. 
Surenhusii, torn. iii. p. 268. 
f Stockii Clavis in verb. 



CHAP. I V.J 



L. A \V S 



ABOUT KINGS. 



115 



Dr. Warburton, in his Divine Legation of Moses, supposes 
it was the true and sole design of this law to forbid the Jews 
the use of cavalry in their armies, which, he says, God did on 
purpose to make it manifest that he protected that nation by 
a special providence. * If so, Solomon does not seem to have 
violated this law so grossly as hath been commonly imagined ; 
for though he kept such a multitude of chariots for state, and 
had twelve thousand horsemen for his life-guard, yet it does 
not appear that he had any cavalry designed for war. 

4thly. The king is forbidden " multiplying wives to him- 
self, that his heart turn not away," Deut. xvii. 17 ; the most 
natural exposition of which law is, that it prohibits polygamy, 
or having more wives than one. For it is not here said, 
" He shall not greatly multiply," as it is in the next clause 
concerning silver and gold, but simply, " he shall not mul- 
tiply." The rabbies, indeed, enlarge the number of wives al- 
lowed the king to eighteen, and understand the law as onlv 
forbidding his having more,f which they attempt to ground 
on David's having six wives, a list of whom we have in the 
Second Book of Samuel, chap. iii. 2 — 5, compared with what 
the prophet afterward tells him, that if he had not offended 
God, he "would moreover have given him such and such 
things," chap. xii. 8, which they interpret of twice as many 
wives more, in all eighteen. J And, in their opinion, no king 
should have a greater number than God would have allowed 
David. Solomon, without doubt, heinously transgressed this 
law, who had seven hundred wives and three hundred con- 
cubines ; 1 Kings xi. 3. And the sad effect was, what this 
law was intended to prevent, that they *' turned away his 
heart from God." 

5thly. The king is also forbid " greatly to multiply to him- 
self silver and gold;" Deut. xvii. 17. This Solomon did in a 
remarkable manner ; for it is said, that " the weight of gold 

* Sensus est, inquit Abarbanel, regem sibi non debere multiplicare equos 
ex terra vel sua vel aliorum ; neque confidere suse multitudini et potential, 
non equis et equitibus numerosis, sed unicam suam fiduciam debere esse 
Deum. Ubi supra, p. 440. 

f Mish. Sanhedrin, cap. ii. sect. iv. torn. iv. p. 217, edit. Surenhus, et 
Gemar. in excerptis Cocceii, cap. ii. sect. viii. 

J R. Ob. de Bartenora in Mish. capite supra citato, p. 118, 

i 2 



116 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



that came to him in one year was six hundred, threescore, and 
six talents, besides what he received from the merchantmen, 
and in particular from the traffic of the spice merchants, and 
from the kings of Arabia, and from the governors of the 
country ; and that, besides a vast quantity of targets and 
shields, all of beaten gold, and a throne overlaid with gold, 
all his drinking vessels, and all the vessels of the house of the 
forest of Lebanon, were of this precious metal; silver being in 
Jerusalem, in a manner, as plenty as stones, and little esteemed 
in his days;" 1 Kings x. 14 — 27. Notwithstanding no par- 
ticular reason is given for this prohibition of multiplying silver 
and gold, we may easily conceive the design of it was, partly 
to prevent the king's oppressing the people with taxes, in order 
to enrich himself, as seems to have been done by Rehoboam, 
whose treasurer the people, therefore, stoned, 1 Kings xii. 18, 
and partly to restrain him from luxury, the common effect of 
riches ; lest the king's example should debauch and enfeeble 
the nation, and prove its ruin, as the wealth, and consequent 
luxury of the Persians, proved the destruction of their empire. 
The rabbies, indeed, observe, that this law forbids only the 
king's multiplying gold and silver to himself, or to his own 
private coffers, but not to the public treasury, or for national 
exigencies.* 

6thly. The king is enjoined to write for himself a copy of 
the law in a book, out of that which is before the priests and 
Levites, Deut. xvii. 18; that is, from the authentic copy kept 
in the sanctuary. Interpreters differ about the meaning of 
the word rOTD mishne, which we render a copy. The Se- 
venty translate it to BevTepovofiiov, and the Vulgate deuterono- 
mium, that translation generally following the version of the 
Seventy ; from whence some have imagined that the king was 
obliged to transcribe only the book of Deuteronomy .f Mon- 
tanus renders it duplum, which version agrees with Mai- 
monides's interpretation of this law, that " the king was to 
write the book of the law for himself, besides the book that 
was left him by his father ; and if his father had left him none, 
or if that were lost, he was to write him two books of the 

* Maimon. de Regibus, cap. iii. sect. iv. ; Mishn. Sanhedrin, cap. ii, 
sect, iv.; et Maimon. in loc. torn. iv. p. 218, edit. Surenhus. 

f Vid. Abarbanel, Comment, in loc. sive Dissert, ubi supra, p. 441. 



f'HAP. IV.] 



L A W S ABO U T 



KINGS. 



117 



law ;* the one he was to keep in his archives, the other was 
not to depart from him, unless when he went to his throne, or 
to the bath, or to a place where reading would be incon- 
venient. If he went to war, it accompanied him ; if he sat in 
judgment, it was to be by him."f But the word does not im- 
port any more than a single exemplar or copy .J Joshua is 
said to have engraved on the stones, w r hich he erected on 
Mount Ebal, a copy of the law, mitfD mishne, a second, of 
which the autograph was the hrst.§ The design of the pre- 
cept was, undoubtedly, to rivet the divine laws more firmly 
in the memory of the kings, of which, and of their obligations 
to observe them, they became, through the neglect of this pre- 
cept, so ignorant in the days of good king Josiah, that he 
was strangely surprised at what he heard read out of this 
book of the law,|| when it was found in the temple, after 
he had reigned about eighteen years; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 18, 
ct seq. 

7thly. The king was bound to govern by law : for it is en- 
joined him, that he read in this copy of the law all the days 
of his life, that he may learn to fear the Lord his God, to 
keep all the words of this law and these statutes, to do them ; 
Deut. xvii. 19. Instead of making his own will his law, as 
the absolute monarchs of the East generally did, he was to 
rule according to the law which God had given by Moses. 
When Samuel, therefore, told the people the manner, DDttfD 

* This was likewise the opinion of many other Jewish doctors. Vid. 
Carpzov. Annot. ad Schickard. Jus. Reg. p. 82. 
f De Regibus, lib. iii. sect. i. 

\ And so the Mishna understands it, Sanhedrin, cap. ii. sect. iv. 

§ Vid. Leidecker. Not. ad Maimon. de Regibus, lib. ii. sect. i. 

|| It is the opinion of Abarbanel, that this book was the autograph of 
Moses, which no doubt was a discovery that would occasion equal pleasure 
and surprise. To confirm this opinion, Leusden observes that miJH thorah, 
having the He emphatic prefixed in 2 Kings xxii. 11, signifieth that very 
book of the law which was wrote nitfO T>2 bejadk Moseh, by the hand of 
Moses, as it is expressed in the parallel place in Chronicles, which Dr. Ken- 
nicott observes, is a phrase which only occurs there, and naturally means 
one particular MS., namely, the original. Leusd. Philolog. Hebraeo. mixt. 
Dissert, xxvi. sect. xv. p. 175, edit. 2; Kennicott's Second Dissert, on the 
Heb. Text, p. 299, 300. See also Leland's Answer to Christianity as Old 
as the Creation, vol. ii. chap. iv. p. 123 — 126, Dublin edit. 1733. 



118 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I , 



mishpat, of the king that should reign over them, 1 Sam. viii .11, 
describing a most arbitrary and tyrannical one, who would 
take their sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, 
&c, we must not understand him here, as some do, to lay 
down the rightful authority of the king of Israel, but only the 
practice of the arbitrary monarchs around them (for they had 
desired to have a king like the neighbouring nations, ver. 5), 
in order to divert them from so injudicious and ill-advised 
a project. # Accordingly, tDDl^D mishpat is better rendered 
manner in our English version, than jus in the Vulgate and 
diKaioj/ua in the Septuagint. In some other places the word 
signifies merely a manner or custom, without implying any 
legal right. Thus Joseph interprets the dream of Pharaoh's 
butler, that he should again deliver the cup into his sovereign's 
hand, after the " former manner," when he was in office; Gen. 
xl. 13. Again, David is said to have destroyed all the inha- 
bitants of the places on which he made inroads, while he was 
with Achish king of Gath, lest any of them should report, So 
did David, and so will be " his manner/' all the time that he 
dwelleth in the country of the Philistines; 1 Sam. xxvii. 11. 
Nay, the word is used even for a very corrupt and illegal cus- 
tom : and " the priests' custom with the people w T as," as the 
expression is in relation to a very unjustifiable practice of 
Eli's sons; 1 Sam. ii. 13. 

That the king was bound by law, appears from the story of 
Ahab, who desired to purchase Naboth's vineyard ; yet be- 
cause the law forbad the alienation of lands from one tribe or 
family to another, he could not obtain it, till he had got 
Naboth condemned and executed for blasphemy and treason, 
whereupon his estate became forfeited to the crown ; or the 
king, however, seized it ; 1 Kings xxi. 1 — 16. From hence 
it appears, that the Hebrew monarch was only God's viceroy, 
or lieutenant, governing in all respects by his laws, which he 
could not alter, under pretext of amending or improving, nor 
abrogate or repeal on account of any pretended o* appre- 
hended inconvenience arising from them ; and in matters of 
importance, w T hen the law was not clear and certain, he was 

* This is the opinion of Abarbanel, who quotes with approbation the 
following decision of Rabbi Jehuda : " Ista (de jure et judicio regis) non 
fuerunt dicta, nisi ad eos perterrefaciendos." Ubi supra, p. 446. 



CHAP. IV.] 



IN AUG U RATON OF KINGS. 



119 



not to enact and determine by his own authority, but to con- 
sult the oracle, or God himself. 

8thly. The king is charged to be humble, and to govern 
his subjects with lenity and kindness, not as slaves, but as 
brethren, Deut. xvii. 20. Thus David, addressing himself to 
his subjects, styles them his brethren, as well as his people; 
1 Chron. xxviii. 2. The first Christian emperors imitated this 
example of the Hebrew kings ; particularly Constantine the 
Great, who, in his epistle to the people of Antioch, styles 
them his brethren, whom he was bound to love.* And he 
concludes his letter to Eusebius with these words, 6 0£oc at 
$ta<l>v\a%oi, a$e\(f)£ ayair^re, " May God preserve you, beloved 
brother. "+ Other instances of the like sort may be found in 
Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History,:}; and in his Life of Con- 
stantine. § 

Having considered the form of the kingly government, we 
proceed to the rites of inauguration, by which the person 
whom God had appointed to that office was actually invested 
with the royal dignity. 

First. He was anointed. Godwin, following the talmudi- 
cal rabbies,|| asserts, that all kings were not anointed, but 
those only in whom the succession was broken ; and then the 
first of the family was anointed for his successors, except in 
cases of dissension, when there was required a renewed unc- 
tion for the confirmation of his authority. They say, there- 
fore, Solomon, as well as his father David, was anointed, 
1 Kings i. 39, because of the dispute between Adonijah and 
him, concerning the succession to the crown ; and likewise 
Joash, the son of Ahaziah, 2 Kings xi. 12, because the suc- 
cession had been interrupted by Athaliah's usurpation. But 
this opinion has no sufficient foundation in the sacred history ; 
on the contrary, it seems more probable, that all kings were 

* Euseb. de Vit. Constant, lib. hi. cap. lx. 

-f Ibid. cap. lxi. 

X Lib. x. cap. v. et vii. 

§ Lib. ii. cap. xlvi. et lib. iii. cap. xx. 

|| Maimon. de Regibus, cap. i. sect. x. xii. et Comment in Mishn. tit. 
Cherithoth, cap. i.; et Bartenor. in eundem loc. torn. v. p. 237, edit. Su- 
renhus. See testimonies out of the Talmud, and other authors, in Selden, de 
Success, in Pontificat. lib. ii. cap. ix. apud Opera, vol. ii. torn. iii. p. 192, 
193. 



120 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



anointed ; because king, and the anointed, seem in the fol- 
lowing passages to be synonymous terms : u He shall give 
strength unto his king, and exalt the horn of his anointed," 
1 Sam. ii. 10; and again, "David said unto him," that is, to 
the Amalekite who informed him that he had killed Saul, 
" How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thy hand to destroy 
the Lord's anointed?" 2 Sam. i. 14; and, in his lamentation 
on this occasion, he hath these expressions, " The shield of the 
mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul, as though he 
had not been anointed with oil;" ver. 21. These last words 
lose in a manner all their emphasis, supposing that no kings 
were anointed except the first of a family, or only in case the 
right of succession to the crown was uncertain. Nay, it 
should seem from this passage, that those kings whose right 
of succession was doubtful, which had occasioned their being 
anointed, were on this supposition more sacred than others. 
Farther, we read that Jehoahaz, the son of Josiah, when he 
was made king in his father's stead, was anointed, 2 Kings 
xxiii. 30, though there does not appear to have been any 
doubt or dispute about the succession. 

The Hebrew doctors represent it to be the peculiar privilege 
of the kings of the family of David to be anointed with the 
same holy oil which was used in the consecration of the high- 
priest; and tell us, that the kings of the ten tribes were 
anointed with common oil. # But this opinion is hardly to be 
reconciled to a passage in the book of Exodus, where the use 
of the holy oil is appropriated to the consecration of Aaron 
and his sons, and the anointing any other person with it is 
expressly prohibited ; Exod. xxx. 31, 32. They pretend, that 
a dispensation for the use of the holy oil, to anoint the kings, 
was afterward revealed to some prophet ; but of this they pro- 
duce no sort of evidence. It appears, indeed, that the oil 
with which Solomon was anointed was taken out of the taber- 
nacle; 1 Kings i. 39. But that might as well be common oil, 
a considerable quantity of which was kept there for the use of 
the lamps, and which Zadoc the priest might have readier at 
hand on this occasion than any other. However, the following 

* Talmud. Cherithoth, cap. iii. ; vid. Hotting, de Jure Hebraeor, leg. cix. 
p. 138. See also Schickard, de Jure Regio, cap. i. theor. iv. sect. xxxi. 
p. 78, 79. edit. Carpzov. Lipsiee, 1674. 



CHAP. IV.] 



INAUGURATION OF KINGS. 



121 



passage in the Psalms is alleged in favour of the opinion, that 
kings were anointed with the holy oil : " I have found David 
my servant : with my holy oil have I anointed him ;" Psalm 
lxxxix. 20. But, as the person there spoken of, under the 
name of David, # undoubtedly means Christ, to whom alone 
a great part of what is said in that context will agree ; there- 
fore by the holy oil must be understood the influence of the 
Divine Spirit, which was " given to him without measure;" 
John iii. 34. And even if we suppose here is an allusion to 
the anointing of David, the Jewish king, yet the oil used on 
the occasion might possibly be styled holy, not because it was 
of that peculiar composition prescribed in the thirtieth chap- 
ter of Exodus, but because it was typical of the influence of 
the Holy Spirit. 

We read of two different sorts of vessels, in which the oil 
wherewith kings were anointed was contained, the one called 
"]D pack, which we translate a phial, 1 Sam. x. 1 ; the other 
called pp her en, a horn, 1 Kings i. 39. Concerning the dif- 
ference between these two vessels there are various conjectures. 
Some make it to lie in the matter of which they were formed ; 
apprehending the ~JD pack was made of metal, either gold or 
silver, and the pp keren of horn. Others place the difference 
in the shape ; and tell us, that the pp keren was like a horn, 
and the "jD pack like a bottle. Others conceive the difference 
lay in the capacity of the vessels ; and that the pp keren con- 
tained a larger, the "JD pack a smaller quantity. The rabbies 
make the anointing with the oil out of one or the other of 
these vessels, to be ominous of a longer or shorter reign. 
Accordingly they tell us, that Saul and Jehu were anointed 
out of the "]D pack, 1 Sam. x. 1 ; 2 Kings ix. 3 (in the former 
of which texts pack is rendered in our English version a phial, 
in the latter, a box), to denote the shortness of their reigns ; 
but David and Solomon out of the pp keren, 1 Sam. xvi. 13, 
and 1 Kings i. 39, to denote the long succession of David's 
family .f But these are mere conjectures. 

* It ought constantly to be remembered here, that David, in the Hebrew, 
signifies a person beloved, which eminently agrees to the Messiah. 

f R. David Kimchi in 2 Reg. ix. See Schickard. de Jure Regio, cap. i. 
theor. iv. p. 79; Gemara, tit. Cherithoth, See Carpzov. not. (m) in loc. 
Schickard, jam. citat. 



122 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1 



It is farther inquired, whose office and proper business it 
was to anoint the king ; since we read of the ceremony's 
being performed by prophets and by priests : by prophets, as 
by Samuel, who anointed Saul and David ; and by one of the 
sons of the prophets, who was sent by Elisha to anoint Jehu, 
2 Kings ix. at the beginning: by priests, as by Zadoc, at the 
inauguration of Solomon, and by Jehoiada at the coronation 
of Joash; 2 Kings xi. 12. Here some distinguish between 
private and public anointing ; the former, they suppose, was 
before the inauguration, and betokened the person's advance- 
ment to the throne some time afterward, which, they say, 
was performed by a prophet. The latter was at the time of 
the inauguration ; and this, they say, was performed by the 
priest, as in the case of Solomon and Joash. # 

As to the manner of performing this ceremony, all the ac- 
count we have in Scripture is, that the oil was poured upon 
the head. When Samuel anointed Saul, he " took a phial of 
oil, and poured it on his head ;" 1 Sam. x. 1. And when the 
prophet anointed Jehu, it is said, he poured the oil on his 
head; 2 Kings ix. 6. From hence it seems probable, that the 
kings were anointed in the same plentiful manner as the priests 
were at their consecration ; the ointment, or oil, was poured 
upon the head in such a quantity as to run down upon the 
beard, and even to the skirts, or rather the collar, of the gar- 
ment; for so UTHD >D-*?y gnal-pi middothaiv means in the 
following passage of the Psalmist, " It," that is, brethren's 
dwelling together in unity, " is like the precious ointment 
upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's 
beard, that went down, gnal-pi middothaiv, to the skirts, or 
the collar, of his garments," Psalm cxxxiii. 2 ; pi signifying 
the hole in the midst of the robe of the ephod through which 
the head was put, and which was bound about, that it might 
not be rent; Exod. xxxix. 22, 23. The Jewish doctors, 
however, inform us of a difference between the manner of 
anointing a king and a priest ; that the priest was anointed in 
the form of a Greek Chi, or St. Andrew's cross ; and the king- 
in the form of a circle round his head ;f and likewise, that 

* Vid. Scacchi Myrothecium, iii- cap. xlix. 1. p. 1060, et seq. edit. Am- 
stel. 1701. 

f Obadias de Bartenora, et Maimon. in Mishn. tit. Cherithoth, cap. i. 



CHAP. IV.] 



INAUGURATION OF KINGS. 



123 



the king must be anointed in the open air, and near a foun- 
tain ; which they ground upon the history of Solomon's being 
brought to Gihon, which was a fountain, or brook, near Jeru- 
salem, and there anointed by Zadoc; 1 Kings i. 38. # But 
from that particular circumstance in Solomon's inauguration, 
I see no reason to conclude it to have been a law for all suc- 
ceeding kings to be anointed at fountains. The talmudists 
indeed, find a mystery in the kings being anointed by a foun- 
tain, as if it were intended to signify the desired perpetuity 
of his kingdom, or that it might continue like a fountain, 
which runs perpetually, and is never dry.f 

We have only one remark more to make on this head ; and 
that is, that the custom of consecrating of any thing to God 
by a profusion of oil upon it, appears to have been very an- 
cient, from the instance of Jacob's anointing the pillar at 
Beth-el; Gen. xxviii. 18. But when it began, and how it was 
first introduced, we cannot so much as guess, any farther than 
that probably it was by a divine institution. We find it in 
use, through the whole Mosaic dispensation, in the dedication 
both of men and things to the immediate service of God. It 
was designed as emblematical of the gifts and graces pf the 
Spirit of God, which are therefore expressed by unction in the 
New Testament; 1 John ii. 20. 27. And as Christ excelled 
all others in these gifts and graces, he was eminently called 
rwo Massiach, or Messias, from TOD mashach, to anoint. 
Which title is also given, in a lower sense, to the priest, Lev. 
iv. 3, and also to the kings of Israel, 1 Sam. xii. 3. 5. 

We proceed now to the second ceremony at the inaugura- 
tion of a king, which was, crowning him. There is a reference 
to it in these words of the Psalmist, " Thou preventest him," 
that is, the king, " with the blessings of goodness : thou set- 
test a crown of pure gold on his head ;" Psalm xxi. 3. And 

torn. v. p. 237, edit. Surenhus. See passages of other authors in Selden, 
de Success, in Pontificat. lib. ii. cap. ix. apud Opera, vol. ii. torn. iii. 
p. 193—195. 

* Vid. Maimon. de Regibus, cap. i. sect, xi., and a remarkable passage 
out of the Jerusalem and Babylonish Talmud, apud Schickard. Jus Regium 
Hebrceor. ; and Carpzovii notas, p. 71, 72, edit. Lips. 1674. 

f The Talmud referred to above ; and Ralbag and Abarbanel in 1 Kings 
i. 33; with other rabbinical commentators, apud Carpzov. notas, ubi supra. 



124 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1 . 



we read expressly of its being performed at the inauguration 
of king Joash; 2 Kings xi. 12. What the form of the royal 
crown was, we do not pretend to determine ; only observing, 
that the word "itt nezer, by which it is expressed, being used 
for the high-priest's crown, Exod. xxix. 6, which was merely 
a fillet or ribband bound round the head, with a plate of gold 
on the front of it, Exod. xxviii. 36, 37; it is probable the 
royal crown was much of the same shape, or like the diadem 
which we see on the heads of the ancient Roman kings on 
their medals. It seems to have been the custom of the Jewish 
kings, as well as those of the neighbouring nations, to wear 
their crown constantly when they were dressed. King Saul 
had his crown on when he was slain in the battle of Gilboa, 
2 Sam. i. 10; and the king of the Ammonites, when he 
headed his army in war; for when David had reduced Rabbah, 
the royal city, he took the king's crown from his head, and 
put it on his own; 2 Sam. xii. 30. From this custom it may 
reasonably be inferred, that the ancient crowns were much 
less in size and weight than those which are now used by the 
European kings. Yet the crown of the king of the Ammo- 
nites, just mentioned, is said to " weigh a talent of gold, with 
the precious stones/' ubi supra. Now a talent being reckoned 
to be one hundred and twenty-five pounds, such an enormous 
load on the head no man can be supposed to have carried, as 
a part of his ordinary dress. Bochart apprehends, with 
great probability, that the word bpitfD mishkal denotes, not 
the weight but the value of the crown;* for though the 
verb bpW shakal, in the Hebrew, like pendere in the Latin, 
related originally to weight ; by which, before the invention of 
coins, metals were exchanged in traffic; yet, as we have 
shown in our lectures on medals, this word came afterward 
to be applied to the payment of money, when the custom of 
weighing it was laid aside. Thus the Septuagint ren- 
ders Vpttf shakal by rtfxav, estimare, in the fifty-fifth chapter 
of Isaiah and the second verse; and accordingly the noun 
bpWO mishkal may properly denote, not the weight of the 
crown but its value, by reason of the jewels that were set in 
it. Our translators, it seems, with several other learned men, 
suppose an enaloge numeri in the text; it being in the He- 
* Hieroz. part i. lib. ii. cap. xxxviii. 



CHAP. IV.j 



INAUGURATION OF KINGS. 



brew mpN pNi veehen jokrah, and a precious stone ; which, 
however, the Jews interpret more literally, of one jewel only; 
and this, Rabbi Kimchi tells us, was a magnet, by means of 
which this weighty crown was so supported in the air as to be 
no load to the man that wore it. But the conceit, of a mag- 
net's being attracted by the air, is a piece of philosophy worthy 
only of a Jewish rabbi. Josephus says, this jewel was a sar- 
donyx :* which notion, Bochart conjectures, might arise from 
the ancient Jews playing, in their manner, with the phrase 
DD^D mtoy, gnatereth malcam, the crown of the king. The 
word DD^D malcam having the same letters w T ith DD*?Q milcom, 
the name of the god of the Ammonites, they made the ex- 
pression to signify the crown of that god, who is otherwise 
called Moloch : and Moloch, it seems, or Molocas, is the 
Eastern name of the sardonyx ; for Epiphanius,t speaking of 
the sardius, adds, £<m §£ km aXXoc (AtSo^) SapSovv?, og Ka- 
Xutul MoXo^ac-l 

The third ceremony at the inauguration of a king was the 
kiss of homage, which the Jews call the kiss of majesty. 
With respect to Saul we are informed, that tf Samuel took a 
phial of oil, and poured it on his head, and kissed him;" 1 Sam, 
x. 1. This ceremony is probably alluded to in the following 
passage of the Psalmist, " Kiss the son, lest he be angry," &c. 
Psalm ii. 12 ; that is, acknowledge him as your king, pay him 
homage, and yield him subjection. 

Fourthly. The acclamations of the people attended the 
ceremony of inauguration. Thus, in the case of Saul, we are 
informed, that " all the people shouted and said, God save 
the king ;" 1 Sam. x. 24. And when Zadoc anointed Solo- 
mon, " they blew the trumpet and said, God save king So- 
lomon ;" 1 Kings i. 39. 

It may be proper also to mention under this head, the royal 
robes, which, probably, were put on the king at his coronation. 
These, no doubt, were very rich and splendid, as may be con- 
cluded from our Saviour's declaring, in order to set forth the 
beauty which God had imparted to the lilies of the field, that 

* Antiq. lib. vii. cap. vii. in fine, edit. Haverc. 

t De duodecim Gemrnis in Veste Aaronis, cap. i. apud Opera, torn. ii. 
p. 225, 226, edit. Petav. Colon. 1682. 

\ See Bochart. Hieroz. part ii. lib. v. cap. vii. 



126 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 1 . 



" even Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of 
these ;" Matt. vi. 29. This allusion is the more apposite, if, 
as Josephus saith, Solomon was usually clothed in white.* 
And on this supposition, it is probable this was the colour of 
the royal robes of his successors. But it being likewise the 
colour of the priests' garments, the difference between them 
must be supposed to lie in the richness of the stuff they were 
made of. Upon this notion, that the ancient Jewish kings 
wore white garments, the rabbies call persons of distinguished 
birth and high rank Dmn chorim, albati, in opposition to 
those of obscure birth and mean condition, whom they call 
DVDliiTl chashuchim, tenebroai, obscuri. To this distinction 
St. James is supposed to allude, chap ii. 2, when he saith, 
if there come into your assembly a man ev tcrSrrn Xa^nrpa, 
which some render, in a white garment ; and a poor man ev 
taSi)Ti pvirapa, in a dark or dirty one. This criticism, however, 
wants a better support than the opinion of Josephus and the 
rabbies concerning the colour of the robes of the Jewish 
kings; it being certain that the word Xafiirpog is applied by the 
Greek w T riters to any gay colour. Thus Plutarch saith,f that 
weak eyes are offended, irpog airav to \ajnrpov. And Xenophon 
applies the word to such as are clothed in purple, or who are 
adorned with bracelets and jewels, and splendidly dressed. J 
In the book of the Revelation, \afmpoq is used to signify the 
brightness or splendour of the morning star, Rev. xxii. 16 ; 
and likewise, in general, such things as are pleasant and 
agreeable to the sight. Thus in the prophetic doom of the 
great city Babylon, it is said, ''all things which were dainty 
and goodly, raXnrapa, icai ra \ajnrpa, are departed from thee," 
Rev. xviii. 14 ; that is, the things which St. John elsewhere 
expresses by " the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes;" 
1 John ii. 16. Our author's conjecture^ therefore, that the Ro- 
man soldiers putting a purple, and Herod a white, garment on 
Christ, when in derision they clothed him as a king, was in 
conformity to the customs of their respective countries, is very 
pretty and ingenious, but not sufficiently supported ; it being 
far from certain that white was the royal colour amongst 



* Antiq. lib. viii. cap. vii. sect. iii. torn. i. p. 440, edit. Haverc. 
t Citat. a Stephano. 

% yropaed. lib. ii. p. 115, et 117, edit. Hutch. 1738. 



I HAP. IV.] STATE AND GRANDEUR OF KINGS. 127 



the Jews. Something, however, concerning the ceremonies 
used at the inauguration of their kings, in the latter ages of 
their polity, may be conjectured with probability from the 
mock ceremonies which were paid to our blessed Saviour ; see 
Matt, xxvii. 29. 

It may not be improper to add a few words concerning the 
state and grandeur of the Jewish monarchs : which consisted, 
partly, in the profound respect that was paid them ; of which 
we have many instances in their history ; and, partly, in their 
attendants and guards ; particularly the Cherethites and Pe- 
lethites, of whom we have frequent mention in the histories of 
David and Solomon. That they were soldiers, appears from 
their making part of David's army, when he marched out of 
Jerusalem on occasion of Absalom's conspiracy, 2 Sam.xv. 18; 
and likewise when they were sent against the rebel Sheba, the 
son of Bichri ; chap. xx. 7- That they were a distinct corps 
from the common soldiers is evident from their having a pe- 
culiar commander, and not being under Joab, the general of 
the army; 2 Sam.viii. 16. 18. They seem, therefore, to have 
been the king's body-guard, like the Praetorian band among 
the Romans. The Cherethites were originally Philistines (see 

1 Sam. xxx. 14, and 16, compared, and Zeph.ii. 5), who were 
skilful archers ; and it is therefore supposed, that after the 
Israelites had suffered so much by the Philistine archers at 
the fatal battle of Gilboa, 1 Sam. xxxi. 3, David not only 
took care to have his people instructed in the use of the bow, 

2 Sam. i. 18, but having made peace with the Philistines, 
hired a body of these archers (it may be with a view of in- 
structing his own people), and made them his guards. With 
these were joined the Pelethites ; who are supposed to have 
been native Israelites, for we find two of the name of Peleth 
among the Jewish families ; one of the tribe of Reuben, 
Numb. xvi. 1 ; another of the tribe of Judah, 1 Chron.ii.33. 
The Chaldee Paraphrase every where calls the Cherethites 
and Pelethites, archers and slingers. Their number may 
probably be gathered from the targets and shields of gold, 
which Solomon made for his guards, which were five hun- 
dred ; see 1 Kings x. 16, 17, compared with 2 Chron. xii. 
9—11. 

As an article of the state and magnificence of the Jewish 



128 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 



kings, it may be proper to mention Solomon's royal throne, 
which was raised on six steps, adorned with the images of 
lions, and overlaid with ivory and gold ; 1 Kings x. 18 — 20. 

The last honours paid the king were at his death. It is 
said, the royal corpse was carried by nobles to the sepulchre, 
though it were at a very considerable distance.* However 
this be, we read of public mourning observed for good kings : 
2 Chron. xxxv. 24; see also Jerem. xxii. 18; and xxxiv. 5. 
Yet, notwithstanding this royal state and grandeur, they were 
only God's viceroys, bound to govern according to the statute 
law of the land, which they, as well as their subjects, were 
required to obey. The rabbies tell us, that their violation of 
some laws was punished with whipping by order of the San- 
hedrim ; an account which is so utterly improbable, especially 
as not a single instance can be produced of this punishment 
being inflicted, that it would not deserve to be mentioned, 
were it not espoused by such learned men as Selden,f Schick- 
ard,;]; and Grotius.^ Besides what hath been observed against 
this notion by Leusden,|| and Carpzovius,^" I apprehend I 
have rendered it at least probable, that the Sanhedrim, to 
whom the rabbies ascribe such extraordinary powers, did not 
exist till the time of the Maccabees. 

* Schickard. JusRegium, cap. vi.; theor. xix. p. 415 — 417, edit. Carpzov. 
Lipsiae, 1674. 

f Selden. de Synedr. lib. ii. cap. ix. sect. v. apud Opera, vol. i. torn. ii. 
p. 1437, though afterward, having recited the arguments on both sides, he 
expresseth himself more doubtfully, lib. iii. cap. ix. sect. v. in fine. 

X Schickard. de Jure Regio, cap. ii. theor. vii. p. 141, 142, edit. Carpzov. 

§ Grot, de Jure Belli et Pacis, lib. i. cap. iii. sect. xx. 2, p. 79, 80, edit. 
Gronov. Hagae, com. 1680. To account, for this flagellation, he supposes it 
was not inflicted on the king by any others, as a punishment ; but was a 
voluntary infliction of his own, as a token of his penitence. But this is not 
agreeable to the representation given by the Hebrew doctors. 

|| Leusden. Philolog. Hebneo mixt. dissert, xxv. sect. x. p. 1 67-— 169, 
edit, secund. Ultraject. 1682. 

11 Not. ad Schickard. loc. supra citat. 



CHAPTER V. 



OF THE HIGH-PRIESTS, PRIESTS, LEVITES, AND 
NETHINIMS. 

With respect to the priests, we propose to inquire, 

1st. What sort of officers in the Hebrew commonwealth 
they were : and, 

2dly. To whom it appertained to execute that office. 

Our first inquiry is, what sort of officers the priestswere, 
who are called in the Hebrew D^rD cohanim. The reason 
of this inquiry is, because we find in Scripture the title cohanim 
applied to the officers of state, as well as to the ministers of 
the sanctuary. Thus, in the Second Book of Samuel, David's 
sons are said to have been cohanim; 2 Sam. viii. 18. That 
they were not ministers of the sanctuary is certain, because 
they were of the tribe of Judah, not of Levi, to which 
tribe the ecclesiastical ministry was by the law expressly 
limited . Their being called cohanim, therefore, can mean no 
other than as our translators render the word, chief rulers, 
or principal officers of state. And so, indeed, this title seems 
to be explained in the parallel place in Chronicles, where the 
sons of David are said to have been "j^DH *vh DWin harish- 
onim lejadh hammelek, primi ad manum regis, " chief about 
the king;" 1 Chron. xviii. 17. Thus also Ira, the Jairite, is 
called l^lb p3 cohhi It-David, which our translators render, 
" chief ruler about David;" 2 Sam. xx. 26. But more com- 
monly the title cohanim is given to the minister of the sanc- 
tuary, who offered sacrifices, and other ways officiated in 
the public worship. Hence arises that uncertainty, whether 
Potipherah and Jethro, the former the father-in-law of Jo- 
seph, the latter of Moses, were ecclesiastical or civil persons ; 
which our translators have expressed by calling them priests 
in the text, and prince in the margin : Gen. xli. 45; Exod. ii. 
16. The true reason of the different application of the word 

K 



130 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



cohanim seems to be, that in the primary sense it imports 
those that minister to a king. They who were "J/Dn vb lejadh 
hammelek, about the king, or his ministers, were called his 
D'OrD cohanim. And therefore, as God is a king, he had his 
cohanim as well as earthly monarch s, or such as attended on 
his special presence in the sanctuary, and ministered in the 
sacred service. Accordingly, having taken upon himself the 
character of the king of Israel, he commanded Moses to con- 
secrate Aaron and his sons, ]njb lecahhi li, Exod. xxx. 30, 
to be his cohanim. Accordingly, God's cohanim are said to 
come near unto the Lord (Exod. xix. 22; Numb. xvi. 5), as 
the ministers of state come near to a king, and attend in his 
presence. 

It has been made a question, in which sense we are to un- 
derstand the word JTO cohhi in the following passage of the 
Psalmist : " Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Mel- 
chizedek;" Psalm ex. 4. Many of the later rabbies, who 
think David is the person there spoken of, understand by pD 
cohhi, a king, in the civil and political, since it is certain Da- 
vid was not a cohhi in the ecclesiastical, sense. * But in this 
they are undoubtedly mistaken; for not only is it certain from 
several quotations, in the New Testament, of the Psalm, 
wherein this passage is contained, that it relates to Christ ;f 
but the word cohhi is no where used to signify a king, but 
always one that ministers to a king. Melchizedek, it is true, 
was a king in Salem ; nevertheless it was on account of an- 
other office which he executed, that he is called a cohhi, 
Gen. xiv. 18; namely, as he ministered in metis, or in the 
solemnities of divine worship. He was a king over men, but 
at the same time a cohhi to the most hi oh God. Of these 
sacred or ecclesiastical cohamin, we propose to discourse, 
and proceed to inquire, 

2dly. To whom it appertained to execute the office of an 
ecclesiastical cohhi, or priest, especially in offering sacrifices. 

In order to resolve this question, it will be necessary to dis- 
tinguish the sacred rites into private, domestic, and public. 
It is supposed, that in the most ancient times eveiy private 

* R. David Kimchi in loc. 

f And so it is understood by the ancient rabbies. See Owen on the 
Hebrews, vol. i. exercitat, ix. sect. xxvi. 



CHAP. V.] 



PRIESTS. 



131 



person was allowed to offer sacrifices for himself. When 
Cain and Abel brought each of them an offering to the Lord, 
there is no mention of any priest officiating for them, though 
it does not appear that either of them sustained any public 
character, or had been consecrated to the sacerdotal office ; 
see Gen. iv. The talmudists, indeed, are of opinion, that 
they brought their sacrifices to Adam, that he might offer 
them on their behalf; but of this there is not the least hint in 
the sacred history. # When a sacrifice was offered, or rather 
sacred rites were performed for a family, it seems to have 
been done by the head of it ; thus Xoah sacrificed for himself 
aiid family, Gen. viii. 20; and likewise Jacob, Gen. xxxv. 3. 
Job "offered burnt-offerings for his daughters and his sons, 
according to the number of them all ;" chap. i. 5. It has been 
commonly supposed, rather than proved, that the priest's office 
was hereditary in every family, descending from the father to 
the eldest son. When, in process of time, several families 
were combined into nations and bodies politic, the king, as 
head of the community, officiated as priest for the whole. 
Thus Melchizedek was both king and priest in Salem ; and 
Moses, as king in Jeshurun (which is another name for Israel), 
officiated as priest in the solemn national sacrifice offered on 
occasion of Israel's entering into covenant with God at 
Horeb. Moses sprinkled the blood of the sacrifice upon the 
altar, and upon the people ; Exod. xxiv. 6. 8. 

Indeed, the sacrifices are said to have been offered by 
" young men of the children of Israel, whom Moses sent or 
appointed," ver. 5: that is, says the Targum of Onkelos, by 
the first-born of the sons of Israel, who were the priests and 
sacrificers, till the Levites, being appointed instead of them, 
had the priesthood settled in their tribe. The Arabic and 
Persic versions favour this opinion. However, it is to be ob- 
served, that Dn#3 nangnarim, which we render young men, 
does not always signify those who are young in years, but 
those who are fit for service ; and accordingly it is applied to 
ministers, or servants of any kind: Gen. xiv. 24; xxii. 3; 
2 Sam. xviii. 15; 1 Kings xx. 14. There is no necessity, 
therefore, that we should understand by the Dnjn nangnarim, 
whom Moses sent to offer burnt-offerings, and to sacrifice 
* Vid. Heidescger. Histor. Fatriarch, torn, i. exercitat. v. p. 177. 
K 2 



132 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOO K I 



peace-offerings, proper priests, consecrated to that office ; for 
they might be only servants, employed to kill and prepare the 
sacrifices, while he, as priest, sprinkled the blood of them on 
the altar, and on the people. Moses is, therefore, by the 
Psalmist, called a priest : " Moses and Aaron among his 
priests Psalm xcix. 6. 

But when God made a more perfect settlement of their 
constitution, and gave them his law at Sinai, he allotted the 
public sacerdotal office to Aaron and his sons, and entailed it 
on their posterity ; and though the whole tribe of Levi, to 
which Aaron belonged, was appointed to the service of the 
sanctuary, namely, to perform the lower offices relating to tLe 
public worship, yet it was now made a capital crime for any, 
besides Aaron, and his sons and descendants, to officiate as 
priests, in the more solemn acts of offering sacrifices, burning 
incense, and blessing the people. Insomuch that when Korah 
and his companions (though Korah was of the tribe of Levi) 
attempted to invade the priest's office, Numb. xvi. 10, God 
executed his vengeance upon them in a very remarkable man- 
ner, as a warning to all others, ver. 31 — 33, and confirmed 
the priesthood anew to Aaron and his family by the miracu- 
lous sign of the budding of his rod ; chap. xvii. It was now 
no more lawful for the king, than for the meanest of the 
people, to officiate in the priest's office. This is evident from 
the remonstrance which Azariah and his companions made to 
king Uzziah, when he " went into the temple of the Lord, to 
burn incense upon the altar of incense" (perhaps out of a vain 
ambition of imitating the heathen kings, who in many places 
executed the priesthood, and that he might in all respects ap- 
pear as great as they) ; and from the judgment which God 
inflicted upon him for it; 2 Chron. xxvi. 16. 21. 

Here a considerable difficulty arises, in that after the giving 
of the law (by which the priesthood was limited to Aaron's 
family), we have an account of several kings, judges, and 
prophets, taking upon them to officiate as priests, sacrificing 
and blessing the people, who yet were not of the family of 
Aaron, nor of the tribe of Levi, without any censure passed 
upon them ; nay, it should seem, with the divine approbation. 
Samuel, who was of the tribe of Ephraira, was waited for, 
that, according to his custom, he might bless the sacrifice. 



CHAP. V.] 



PRIESTS. 



133 



1 Sam. ix. 13. And, on another occasion, he "offered a 
lamb for a burnt-offering to the Lord 1 Sam. vii. 9. Both 
which acts did properly belong to the priest. King Saul 
offered a burnt-offering, 1 Sam. xiii. 9 ; and David offered 
"burnt-offerings and peace-offerings before the Lord, and 
blessed the people in the name of the Lord of hosts 2 Sam. 
vi. 17, 18. Solomon, likewise, blessed the people, as well as 
prayed in the public congregations, at the dedication of the 
temple ; 1 Kings vii. 54. And the prophet Elijah sacrificed 
a bullock ; 1 Kings xviii. 30. 

The common solution of this difficulty is, that these kings 
and prophets caused the priests to perform the sacrifices for 
them, and are said to do what was done by their order. But 
this sense of the expressions used on these occasions, is too 
forced to be easily admitted. What Elijah is said to have 
done, in particular, in the forecited passage, seems evidently 
to have been done by himself ; and cannot, without great 
force upon the words, be understood of any other person's 
doing it for him. The difficulty, therefore, is perhaps better 
solved by supposing, that when these persons acted as priests, 
they did it not, as being heads of the people, but as being 
prophets, and under the special direction of the Spirit of God, 
who had, no doubt, a right to dispense with his own laws, and 
sometimes did, on extraordinary occasions. Some, on this 
principle, interpret the words of Samuel to Saul ; " The Spirit 
of the Lord shall come upon thee, and thou shalt prophesy ; 
then do thou as occasion shall serve thee, for God is with 
thee," 1 Sam. x. 6, 7 ; that is, according to them, when thou 
art thus endowed with the Spirit, thou mayest follow his di- 
rections upon all emergencies, without regarding the letter of 
the law. Though this will not excuse his sacrificing, be- 
cause from his own account it appears, that he did not do it 
by special divine direction, but contrary to his judgment ; he 
" forced himself to it," according to his own expression, " and 
did it out of fear;" 1 Sam. xiii. 11, 12. 

With respect to the different orders and ranks of priests, 
and of other ministers about the Jewish temple-service, God- 
win saith, they were three, Priests, Levites, and Nethinims; 
and he adds, they may be paralleled with ministers, deacons, 
and subdeacons in the primitive church ; and over them the 



134 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I, 



high-priest was cliief. In this manner the Papists pretend to 
found their ecclesiastical hierarchy on the Jewish establish- 
ment; comparing the pope with the high-priest, the clergy 
with the priests, the lay monks and cathedral officers, such as 
their singing men and boys, &c, with the Levites and Nethi- 
nims. But the author has not produced, from the New Tes- 
tament, his evidence of such a distinction of ministers in the 
primitive Christian church as he here speaks of. There we 
have not the least intimation of two sorts of deacons, the one 
preachers, the other not ; but only of one sort, whose province 
was to take care of the poor, and of the other temporal mat- 
ters relating to the church.* But to return. 

The priesthood was entailed on the posterity of Aaron, in 
whom the succession was continued, Exod. xxviii. 43, and 
xxix. 9 ; and he having four sons, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar 
and Ithamar, 1 Chron. vi. 3, they, together with their father, 
were consecrated to the sacerdotal office. It was not long 
before Nadab and Abihu were both struck dead by fire from 
heaven. The crime, thus severely punished, was their pre- 
suming to burn incense in the tabernacle with other fire than 
that which God had commanded to be used, Lev. x. 1, 2„ 
and which he ordered to be kept constantly burning on the 
altar, having been first lighted by a flash from heaven, 
whereby the first victims that were offered on the altar, after 
it was erected, had been consumed in the presence of the 
people; Lev. ix. 24. As, immediately upon this, Aaron and 
all the priests were forbid to drink wine, or any other intox- 
icating liquors, whenever they went into the tabernacle, " lest 
they should die/' Lev. x. 9, the Jews, with some reason, con- 
clude, that the crime of these two priests was their being 
drunk when they went to officiate in the tabernacle. 

Nadab and Abihu thus dying before their father, and leav- 
ing no children, 1 Chron. xxiv. 2, there remained Eleazar 
and Ithamar, in whose posterity the family of Aaron, or of 
the priests, was distinguished into two branches. Godwin 
saith, that " the high priesthood was tied or limited to the 
line of Aaron's first born," that is, to the line of Eleazar, who 
immediately succeeded his father in the office of high-priest, 

* See the account of their institution and office, Acts vi., at the beginning, 



CHAP. V.] 



PRIESTS. 



135 



Numb. xx. 26. 28, and was succeeded by his eldest son 
Phinehas, who had the dignity confirmed to him, and entailed 
on the line of his posterity, for the pious zeal which he showed 
against idolatry and lewdness. " Behold, I give him my 
covenant of peace, saith God, and he shall have it, and his 
seed after him, even the covenant of an everlasting priest- 
hood Numb. xxv. 12, 13. However, this promise must be 
understood conditionally, in case the eldest branch of his house 
was fit to discharge this high office, or did not forfeit the dig- 
nity by some notorious wickedness ; for upon any such failure 
in the line of Phinehas, it was to be transferred to the eldest 
branch of the line of Ithamar. Accordingly, we find there 
were several changes from one line to the other, between the 
death of Aaron and the captivity of Israel. It first continued 
through seven successions in the line of Eleazar, and was then 
translated to the line of Ithamar, in the person of Eli, who 
was both high-priest and judge in Israel. That he was of the 
family of Ithamar, not of Eleazar, is concluded from his name 
not being inserted in the genealogy of Eleazar, 1 Chron. vi. 
3, &c. ; and from Josephus's saying that he was of the family 
of Ithamar.* Eli, then, was the first of that line who was 
raised to this high dignity, and in his family it continued till 
the reign of Saul, who caused Ahimelcch, the son of Ahitub, 
to be slain, and probably transferred the priesthood to Zadoc, 
who was of the Phinehan line ; for in David's time we find 
Zadoc joined with Abiathar (who had escaped the massacre of 
the priests 4 of Ithamar's line) in the execution of the high 
priesthood ; 2 Sam. xx. 25. It may be presumed, that Zadoc 
having been advanced by Saul, and being also of the eldest 
line of Aaron's family, David did not choose to depose him, 
and therefore joined him with Abiathar, whose father and 
other relations had lost their lives on his account, and whom 
he had acknowledged as high-priest, and had accordingly in- 
quired of the Lord by him, presently after his father's death ; 
1 Sam. xxiii., beginning. And thus Zadoc and Abiathar con- 
tinued partners in this dignity through the reign of David. 
It is said, indeed, in the account of this king's principal officers 
and ministers in the Second Book of Samuel, that " Zadoc, 
the son of Ahitub, and Ahimelech, the son of Abiathar, were 
* Antiq. lib. v. cap. ult. 



136 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



the priests;" 2 Sam. viii. 17. In this passage here are two 
things which require explanation : the first is, that Ahimelech 
is said to be the son of Abiathar, whereas Abiathar was the 
son of Ahimelech. But this difficulty is removed by the easy 
supposition, that Abiathar might have a son, called after his 
father Ahimelech. The second is, that Ahimelech, instead 
of his father Abiathar, is joined as priest with Zadoc. The 
most probable solution of this is, that Abiathar, through in- 
dolence or sickness, not much attending to the duty of his 
office, his son Ahimelech commonly officiated for him ; and 
on that account, he, rather than his father, is named with Za- 
doc, as executing the priest's office. Afterward, when Solo- 
mon was fixed on his throne, he degraded Abiathar for his 
treason in the conspiracy of Adonijah, 1 Kings ii. 27, and put 
Zadoc in his room, ver. 35, that is, established him in the 
office alone : and in his line the succession continued till the 
captivity. But though Abiathar was turned 'out of his office, 
it seems he was still honoured with the title of high-priest as 
before ; for, presently after, we find him named with Zadoc, 
as in David's time ; 1 Kings iv. 4. The truth is, he was now 
reduced to the same rank which the eldest branch of the line 
of Ithamar held, before the translation of the priesthood to 
Eli, that is, he was second in the ecclesiastical dignity. This 
probably was the case with Zephaniah, mentioned by the 
prophet Jeremy, who styles " Seraiah the chief, and Zepha- 
niah the second priest/' Jer. lii. 24, these two being the eldest 
branches of the two lines of Aaron's family. 

Many have been the conjectures concerning the reason of 
the first translation of the high priesthood from Eleazar's to 
Ithamar's family, in the person of Eli. One is, the idolatry 
which Micah introduced among the Israelites, which the high- 
priest is supposed to have countenanced and encouraged ; 
see Judges xviii. 

To this it may be objected, not only that this idolatry seems 
to have been peculiar to the tribe of Dan, or rather to a small 
part of that tribe which settled at Laish, ver. 28 — 30 ; but 
that, though the history of this affair is placed near the end of 
the book of Judges, it is generally thought to have happened 
soon after the death of Joshua,* before there was " any judge 

* Josephus seems to have been of this opinion concerning the early date 



CHAP. V.] 



PRIESTS. 



137 



in Israel;"* that is, at least three hundred years before the 
translation of the priesthood out of Eleazar's family. And it 
cannot be supposed, that if the degradation of that family had 
been the punishment of this sin, it would have been so long 
delayed. 

Dr. Lightfoot conjectures, that God's depriving Eleazar's 
family of the pontifical dignity for several successions, was on 
account of the ignorance or carelessness of the high-priest, in 
suffering Jephthah to sacrifice his daughter :f whence you 
will observe, it was his opinion he did actually sacrifice her. 
After all, nothing can be advanced here beyond bare conjec- 
ture, the Scripture no where informing us of the reason for which 
the line of Eleazar was thus degraded. But, considering how 
many legal imperfections would disqualify a man for that high 
dignity, it is no wonder that the lineal succession was often 
interrupted, and the second priest, or the head of one line of 
Aaron's family, placed above the natural successor in the 
other line. However, it has been generally thought, and with 
reason, that some enormous crime was the cause of the first 
translation from the family of Eleazar to that of Ithamar; 
partly, because God had by covenant entailed the succession 
on the Phinehan line, as was observed before ; and partly, 
because the next translation back again, from the line of Itha- 
mar to that of Eleazar, was on account of the sins of Eli's 
sons. " I chose the house of thy father Aaron," saith God 
to Eli by the prophet, " to offer up incense and sacrifices 
upon mine altar. Why then do ye kick at my sacrifices ? 
Therefore, though I said that thine house should stand before 
me for ever, now be it far from me. Behold the days come, 
that thou shalt see an enemy in thine habitation, and I will 
raise me up a faithful priest;" 1 Sam. ii. 27, &c. By an 
enemy, or rival (as some would translate the word I'm tsar), 
may probably be meant the eldest branch of the other line, 
who, though set aside for a time, was to be reinstated in the 
supreme dignity. 

of Micah's idolatry ; for he places the story of the Levite, related in the next 
chapter, soon after the death of Joshua. Antiq. lib. v. cap. ii. 

* See ver. 1 ; and likewise above, book i. chap. i. p. 46. 

t Lightfoot's Harmony of the Old Testament, on Judges xi. xii. sub Anno 
Mundi, 2819. 



138 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK I 



There appear, by the Scripture account, to have been thirty 
high priests from Aaron to Jozedeck, who was carried captive 
into Babylon ; yet we cannot be sure there were no more, 
since the Scripture no where professes to give us an exact list. 
After the captivity, the regularity of succession was little re- 
garded. The Jews acknowledge that some got into the office 
by money and it is said, that some of the high-priests de- 
stroyed one another by witchcraft. Whether we give credit 
to this account or not, it shows that several of them, in those 
latter ages of the Jewish church, were corrupt and vicious 
men, and left a very bad character behind them. Some rab-. 
bies reckon eighty high-priests, from the return from the Ba- 
by lonish captivity to the destruction of the second temple; 
others eighty-four or eighty-five.t 

We now proceed to consider, 

1st. The consecration of the Jewish priests to their office ; 
and, 

2dly. The office itself, to which they were consecrated ; show- 
ing under both heads in what respects the high-priest and the 
inferior priests were alike, and wherein they differed. 

In discoursing of the consecration of the high-priest, God- 
win begins with the anointing of him, as one thing wherein he 
differed from the inferior priests. But the Scripture mentions 
his being clothed with the pontifical garments, as previous to 
his unction: "The holy garments of Aaron shall be his sons' 
after him, to be anointed therein, and to be consecrated in 
them;" Exod. xxix. 29. There was still another ceremony, 
previous both to anointing and clothing, and common to the 
high-priest and to the inferior priests, namely, their being 

* Vid. Bartenora, et Maimon. in Mishn. tit. Joma. cap. i. sect. iii. torn. ii. 
p. 208, edit. Surenhus. 

f On the succession of the high-priests, consult Selden de Successione in 
Pontificatum ; Reland. Antiq. Hebrffi. part ii. cap. iii. ; and Prideaux's Con- 
nect, part i. book i. sub anno 656 ante Christum. Selden's second book De 
Successione in Pontif. contains a large account out of the rabbies of the in- 
quiries which were made previous to the initiation of the high-priest, whether 
he was next in blood, and born of a marriage allowed by the law ; whether 
he was of a proper age, that is, arrived to puberty ; whether he had any bodily 
defect, or was addicted to any vice which disqualified him. The like inquiries 
are said to have been made, mutatis mutandis, concerning the common priests, 
previous to their consecration. 



CHAP. V.] ANOINTING OF THE PRIESTS. 139 

washed with water : " Aaron and his sons thou shalt bring 
unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and shalt 
wash them with water;" ver. 4. From hence, some ex- 
plain those words of our Saviour to John the Baptist, when 
he desired to be baptized of him : " Thus it becometh us to 
fulfil all righteousness," Matt. iii. 15 ; that is, being about to 
enter on his priestly office, it became him to be baptized, or 
washed, according to the law which he was subject to; or, 
as the apostle expresses it, " was made under;" Gal. iv. 4. 
Others think, that " fulfilling all righteousness" here means, 
.owning and complying with every divine institution, which 
John's baptism was.* Be this as it will, the ceremonial 
washing of all the priests was, doubtless, designed to be ty- 
pical of that purity of heart and life which is declared to be 
essential to the ministers of the gospel ; 1 Tim. iii. 2. 7, and 
elsewhere. 

We now proceed to consider the unction, which was an- 
other ceremony at the consecration of the priests. Godwin 
represents this anointing (which term, he seems to think, in- 
timates the profusion of the oil used on the occasion) as pe- 
culiar to the high-priest; whereas the second priests, he saith, 
were only sprinkled with this oil, mingled with the blood of 
the sacrifices. But in this he is undoubtedly mistaken ; for 
as the ceremony of sprinkling was common to Aaron and his 
sons, Lev. viii. 30, so also was the anointing. Thus the 
Lord spake unto Moses, " Thou shalt anoint Aaron and his 
sons, and consecrate them, that they may minister unto me in 
the priest's office ;" Exod. xxx. 30. Again, it is said, " These 
are the names of the sons of Aaron, the priests, who were 
anointed, whom he consecrated to minister in the priest's 
office, even Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar;" Numb, 
iii. 3. There seems, however, to have been this difference 
between the high-priest and the common priests, that every 
high-priest was anointed at his consecration, at least before 
the captivity; whereas none of the common priests were 
anointed after the immediate sons of Aaron. Every high- 
priest, I say, was anointed ; only when Eleazar succeeded his 
father in the high priesthood, the ceremony of anointing seems 



* Witsii Miscell. torn. ii. lib. ii. dissert, ii. sect. 47. 



140 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1. 



to have been omitted at his consecration, because he had been 
anointed before, when he was consecrated a common priest. 
There is no other account, therefore, of the ceremony of his 
instalment, but his being clothed with his father's pontifical 
garments; Numb. xx. 28. That the succeeding high-priests 
were anointed at their consecration, may be certainly inferred 
from that perpetual law concerning the high-priest (meaning 
not only Aaron, but any of his successors in that office), 
wherein he is called '* the priest that is anointed Lev. iv. 3 ; 
see also ver. 16. And this being the distinguishing character 
of the high-priest, it may likewise be inferred, that the 
common priests, the successors of Aaron's sons, were not 
anointed . 

Maimonides and the talmudical rabbies speak much of a 
sacerdos ad helium unctus, or priest anointed for war, who, 
they say, was anointed with the same oil that the high-priest 
was, as being little inferior to him in dignity, though in the 
sanctuary he ministered only as a common priest, and wore 
no other garments than they did. His proper office, as they 
inform us, was to attend the camp in time of war, and en- 
courage the people to the battle, according to the following law : 
" And it shall be, when ye are come nigh unto the battle, that 
the priest shall approach, and speak unto the people, and 
shall say unto them, Hear, O Israel, you approach this day 
unto battle against your enemies : let not your hearts faint ; 
fear not, and do not tremble, neither be ye terrified because 
of them. For the Lord your God is he that goeth with you, 
to fight for you against your enemies, to save you ;" Deut. xx. 
2 — 4. Maimonides saith, that when he, who is anointed 
for the war, standing on a high place, before the whole army, 
hath pronounced these words in the holy tongue, another 
priest under him proclaimeth it to all the people with a loud 
voice : and then the anointed priest saith, " What man is there 
that hath built a new house, and hath not dedicated it ? Let 
him go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and 
another man dedicate it. What man is there that hath 
planted a vineyard, and hath not yet eaten of it ? Let him also 
go and return unto his house, lest he die in the battle, and 
another man eat of it. What man is there that hath betrothed 
a wife, and hath not taken her ? Let him go and return unto 



CHAP. V.] 



ANOINTING OF THE 



PRIESTS. 



141 



his house, lest he die in battle, and another man take her f 
Deut. xx. 5 — 7. Thus much the anointed priest speaketh, 
and the officer proclaimeth it aloud to the people. Afterward 
the officer himself speaketh, and saith, "Whatman is there 
that is fearful and faint-hearted? Let him go and return unto 
his house, lest his brethren's heart faint as well as his heart," 
Deut. xx. 8; and another officer proclaims it to the people.* 
Now, though it may be very naturally supposed, that some of 
the priests attended the camp, as a kind of chaplains to the 
regiments, and as having some particular service assigned 
them, which made their presence necessary, namely, to blow 
with the trumpets, Numb. x. 8, 9, and to encourage the 
people ; nevertheless, that there was one priest peculiarly con- 
secrated to this service, and of superior dignity to the common 
priests, does not appear in Scripture ; and we have, therefore, 
no reason to believe (notwithstanding this rabbinical fiction) 
that any priests, after the sons of Aaron, were anointed, but 
the high-priest only. 

The ointment, or oil, with which the priest was anointed, 
is described, and there is a receipt for making it in the book 
of Exodus, chap. xxx. 23 — 25. It was compounded of spicy 
drugs, namely, myrrh, sweet cinnamon, sweet calamus, and 
cassia, mixed with oil olive. Maimonides pretends to tell us 
the manner of making this mixture. " Each of these four 
spices," saith he, " was pounded separately : then they were 
all mixed together, and a strong decoction of them made 
with water, which, being strained from the ingredients, was 
boiled up with the oil, till the water was all evaporated. 
The rabbies are very positive, that no more of this holy oil 
was made after that which Moses made, for anointing the 
tabernacle, and the first set of priests. J And they ground 

* Maimon. de Regibus, chap. vii. sect. i. — iv. 

f De Apparatu Templi, cap. i. sect. i. apud Crenii Fasciculum Sextum, 
p. 84, et seq.; Comment, in Mishn. tit. Cherithoth, cap. i. sect. i. torn. v. 
p. 237, 238, edit. Surenhus; Hotting, de Legibus Hebrseor. sect. cvii. cviii. ; 
et Schickard. Jus Regium Hebrseor. cum notis Carpzov. theor. iv. p. 63, 
et seq. 

X Vid. Talmud. Cherithoth, cap. i.; et Schickard. Jus Regium; et Carpzov, 
not. p. 67—71. 



142 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book l. 



their opinion on the following passage, which they understand 
as a prohibition of making it in any future time : " This shall 
be an holy anointing oil unto me throughout your generations. 
Upon man's flesh it shall not be poured, neither shall ye 
make any other like it, after the composition cf it; it is holy, 
and shall be holy unto you. Whosoever compoundeth any 
like it, or whosoever putteth any of it upon a stranger, shall 
even be cut off from his people ;" Exod. xxx. 31 — 33. But 
this only means, as Christopher Cartwright justly observes,* 
that none of it should be made for any private or profane use ; 
not that when it was necessary for the holy purposes for 
which it was appointed, no fresh quantity should ever be made 
by the original receipt. Indeed, I can see no reason why a 
receipt should be given for making it, if no more was to be 
made after that first parcel. Besides, the quantity made by- 
Moses with one hin of oil, a measure, according to Bishop 
Cumberland, little more than a wine gallon, could not be 
much more than was sufficient for anointing the tabernacle 
and all its furniture, the altar and all its vessels, the laver, and 
Aaron and his four sons: ver. 26 — 30. Or if any after all 
remained, it could not be sufficient for anointing the succeed- 
ing high-priests for many ages ; nor would it keep so long, 
but evaporate and be dried up. The rabbies, indeed, always 
dexterous at unravelling difficulties, tell us, it was miraculously 
preserved,f like the pot of manna in the ark of the covenant, 
and was multiplied like the widow's cruse of oil, 1 Kings xvii. 
14. They, however, acknowledge it was lost in Josiah's time, 
about fifty years before the destruction of the temple, and 
that after that no more high-priests were anointed. J But if 
by the " two anointed ones," spoken of by Zechariah, " that 
stan$ by the Lord of the whole earth," Zech. iv. 14, are 
meant (as Kimchi and many others understand that passage) 
Joshua the high-priest, and Zerubbabel the governor, who 

* Electa Targumico-Rabbinica in Exod. xxx. 33. 

t Schickard. ubi supra, p. 69; Talmud. Cherithoth, cap. i. et iii.; vid. 
Hottinger. de Juris Hebraeor. Legibus ? leg. cix. ex. p. 138, 139, edit. Tiguri, 
1655. 

X Talmud. Cherithoth, cap. i.; et Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. i. 
sect. viii. ; vid. Schickard. ubi supra, p. 69, 70. 



CHAP. V.] 



ANOINTING Or THE PRIESTS. 



143 



acted as king of the Jews, this will be an evidence, that 
anointing was used even after the captivity. Eusebius is of 
opinion, that it continued in use till our Saviour's time.* 

As to the manner of performing this ceremony, the rabbies 
relate it with as much particularity and confidence as if they 
had been eye-witnesses of it. They tell us, indeed, they 
had the account of it from their wise men, and they had it 
from the prophets, who had seen it performed. They inform 
us, that the oil was poured on the top of the priest's head, 
which was bare, so plentifully, as to run down his face upon 
his beard to the collar of his robe ; and some say, that he 
who anointed him, drew on his forehead, with his finger, the 
figure of the Greek Caph, or Kappa, the first letter of the 
word ji"Q cohhi. Whereas others make it to be the figure of 
the Greek Chi,* which some suppose was for the first letter 
in XP U °> vwg°> and -^pLarog, unctus, in which they discover 
a great typical mystery. But all which can with any certainty 
be depended upon is that very brief account given us in Le- 
viticus : " And Moses poured the anointing oil upon Aaron's 
head;" Lev. viii. 12. And by the Psalmist, when he com- 
pares brotherly love and unity to f< the precious ointment on 
the head, that ran down upon Aaron's beard, that went down 
to the skirts/' or the collar, " of his garments ;" Ps. cxxxiii. 2. 
Some suppose, that, at the consecration of the high-priest, this 
unction was repeated seven days together, an opinion which 
they ground upon a passage in the book of Exodus, where 
that " son of Aaron, who is priest in his stead," that is, high- 
priest, is enjoined, " when he cometh into the tabernacle of 
the congregation, in order to minister in the holy place, to 
wear those garments, in which he was anointed and con- 
secrated, seven days;" Exod. xxix. 29, 30. But it does not 
follow, that therefore he was to be anointed seven times over. 

The high-priest being represented in the New Testament 
as a type of Christ, Godwin very reasonably supposes his 
unction to be typical of those extraordinary gifts and in- 
fluences of the Spirit with which the human nature of our 
Lord was endowed, and which, in allusion to this type, are 

* Euseb. Demonst. Evang. lib. viii. p. 387, edit. Paris, 1628. 
f Vid. de Bartenora et Maimonidem in Mishn. tit. Cherithoth, cap. i. 
sect. i. et Selden. de Success, in Pontificat. lib. ii. cap, ix. 



144 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I 



expressed by anointing him: " God, thy God, hath anointed 
thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows ;" Psalm xlv. 7. 
It is observed, that this spiritual unction of Christ was not 
performed at once, but at three different times, each effusion 
being more plentiful than the former. The first was at his 
birth, and in his minority ; and it appeared in the extraor- 
dinary wisdom which he discovered at twelve years old, inso- 
much, that when at that early age he taught in the temple 
among the scribes and doctors, " all who heard him were 
astonished at his understanding and answers;" Luke ii. 47. 
The second was at his baptism, when the Spirit of God de- 
scended like a dove, and lighted upon him ; Matt. iii. 16. 
The third, and most complete, was upon his ascension, when 
he " received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, 
which he shed forth upon his disciples;" Acts ii. 33. The 
prophecy of the Psalmist, contained in the forty-fifth Psalm, 
to which I referred above, relates, I apprehend, not so much 
to the two former unctions, which were designed to qualify 
him for his ministry on earth, as to that which he received 
after his ascension, in reward of his humiliation and obedience. 

The second part of the ceremony of consecration was en- 
robing the priests with the sacerdotal vestments. These were 
eight, four common to the high-priest and inferior priests, 
and four peculiar to the high-priest. The former were the 
drawers or breeches, the coat, the girdle, and the bonnet or 
turban; Exod. xxviii. 40 — 42. The latter, the robe, the 
ephod, the breast-plate, and the holy crown. All these gar- 
ments, especially those peculiar to the high-priest, were ex- 
ceeding rich and sumptuous ; the colours gay, and disposed in 
a beautiful contrast; they were ornamented with rich em- 
broidery, and set off with gold and jewels; and, no doubt, 
they were very graceful in their shape and form, according to 
the taste of those times. Little, indeed, can be advanced with 
certainty concerning the fashion of several of these vestments, 
Moses having left us hardly any thing more than their names. 
Josephus, indeed, hath given a particular description of them 
all,* and, doubtless, a very faithful one, according to their 
fashion in his time. But who can say, how far it might have 
altered during many ages, and in such various changes as the 
* Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. torn. i. p. 138, edit. Haverc. 



THAP. V.J GARMENTS OF THE PRIESTS. 



145 



Hebrew commonwealth had undergone, from the time of 
Moses ? The account given by the rabbies is very different 
from his; and St. Jerome's, as to some of these garments, 
different from both. The moderns, who have set before us 
lively descriptions, in writing, and in pictures, vary so much, 
that some of them seem to have furnished the world with new 
models for masquerade habits, rather than to have delineated 
the real fashion of the pontifical vestments. # This caution 
premised, we shall endeavour to give you the best account we 
can of these garments, in the order in which they were put on. 

The first was the "O-^WDD michnese-badh, which we render 
"linen breeches;" Exod. xxviii. 42. And according to Jo- 
sephus, it much resembled the modern garment, which we 
call by that name ; for he says it was fastened round the mid- 
dle, £/x/3atvovrwv «c avro tmv 7toSwv, the feet or legs being- 
put into it.f Its use was " to cover their nakedness," as it is 
expressed in the book of Exodus ; that is, for the sake of de- 
cency, when they stood aloft on the altar, and the people 
were beneath them, or even when they were on the ground, 
stooping to perform any part of the sacred service. Moses 
has left us no description of these drawers, only that they 
were made of linen, and that they were to " reach from the 
loins even to the thighs that is, according to the rabbies, to 
the bottom of the thighs, or to the knees. They also inform us, 
that the waistband was a little above the navel, and near the 
heart ; and that they were tied about the waist with a string, 
run through the waistband, in the manner of a purse. This 
garment was common to the high-priests and to the inferior 
priests. % 

That no such garment was wore in Noah's time, seems evi- 
dent, from the story of his being uncovered in his tent, Gen. 
ix. 21 ; nor by the Jews in the time of Moses, except by the 
priests, and that perhaps only when they were officiating at 
the altar, as may be reasonably conjectured from the law in 

* Among others, compare Braunius de Vestitu Sacerd. p. 646, 647. 655, 
edit. 1701; or Witsii Miscell. torn. i. lib. ii. dissert, ii. sect, xlviii., with 
Calmet's Dictionary, under the word priest. 

f Antiq. ubi supra, sect. i. p. 139. 

\ Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. viii. sect, xviii. p. 146 ; Crenii 
Fasciculi Sexti. 

L 



146 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Deuteronomy against the immodest woman, Deut. xxv. 11 ; 
for if it had been commonly wore, she could not easily have 
committed the crime for which she was condemned to lose her 
hand. Probably, in David's time, it was worn only by the 
priests, which may be the reason that when Hanun, king of 
the Ammonites, " shaved off half the beards of David's ser- 
vants," or ambassadors, " and cut off their garments in the 
middle, even to their posteriors," and dismissed them in this 
disgraceful and indecent condition, " they were greatly 
ashamed ;" 2 Sam. x. 4, 5. That this garment was not used 
among the Romans, in latter times, even by their priests, ap- 
pears from Martial's ludicrous description of one who was sa- 
crificing : 

Ipse super virides aras luctantia pronus 
Dum resecat cultro colla, premitque manu, 
Ingens iratis apparuit hernia sacris.* 

Suetonius's account of the manner of Julius Caesar's death, 
makes it more than probable that he wore no such garment. 
t% Utque animadvertit undique se strictis pugionibus peti, toga 
caput obvolvit : simul sinistra manu sinum ad ima crura de- 
duxit, quo honestius caderet ; etiam inferiore corporis parte 
velata."t Upon the whole, it may be reasonably concluded, 
that the use of this decent garment had its origin from the 
divine institution of the Jewish priesthood. 

The second garment, which was put on after the breeches, 
was the r»3ro chethoneth, or coat, as it is called in our trans- 
lation ; Exod. xxviii. 40. It was made of linen ; Exod. xxxix. 
27. We have no description of the fashion of it in Scripture, 
except in the visionary appearance of Christ to St. John, in 
the form and habit of a priest, Rev. i. 13 ; and he is said to 
be avdeSvjuevog iroSrjpr), " clothed with a garment down to the 
feet," which perfectly agrees with the description the Jewish 
writers gave of the chethoneth; who say, that it reached 
down to the feet ; and that it likewise had sleeves which came 
down to the wrist, and was tied about the neck, in the same 
manner as the breeches about the waist ; so that it was not 
much unlike a long shirt. J It was common to the high-priest 

* Lib. iii. epigram. 24. f In Vita Jul. Cses. cap. lxxxii. 

| Mairaon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. viii. sect. xvii. apud Crenii Fas- 
cicul. Sextum, p. 146. " De longitudine tunicarum, erant illse talares, qua- 



( HAP. V.] GARMENTS OF THE PRIESTS. 



147 



and the inferior priests ; except that, perhaps, the tunic of 
the high-priest was rather made of finer linen, or wove in a 
more curious manner ; for it is called ^2ii>n DSHD chethoneth 
tashbets, which we render the "broidered coat;" Exod. xxviii. 
4. Ains worth translates it, ''a coat of circled work ;" and ob- 
serves, that it differed from broidered work, because that was 
of various colours, whereas this coat was all white, but wove 
in circles, or round hollow places, like eyes. The same word, 
he remarks, is used afterwards, ver. 11, for ouches, or hollow 
sockets, in which jewels were set. Dr. Lightfoot conceives 
this tunic to be a sort of diaper, wove in some figure, as 
circles, or checkers.* The high-priest, when he went into the 
holy of holies on the day of expiation, was clothed only in the 
vestes alba, as they are commonly called, or the garments of 
the common priests, Lev. xvi. 4; yet the tunic which he 
then wore is supposed to be somewhat different from, and 
perhaps meaner than theirs; that it might be more suitable to 
the peculiar service and deep humiliation of that day. This is 
thought to be intimated, in the coats made in common for 
Aaron and his sons being called V\D rtiro chethoneth shesh, 
Exod. xxxix. 27 ; whereas the tunic which the high-priest 
wore on the solemn feast day, is called "Q-ruro chethoneth- 
badh; Lev. xvi. 4. The shesh is imagined to be a fine sort of 
Egyptian linen, such as was worn by their princes ; for with 
it Pharaoh clothed Joseph ; Gen. xli. 42. Some take it to be 
a fine cotton; whereas the word m badh, is supposed to im- 
port a common and meaner sort.f 

Braunius is of opinion, that there was no difference between 
the shesh and the badh, as to the fineness of the stuff, the 
michnese badh, or linen breeches, being spoken of as made of 
IWft shesh moshzor, " fine twined linen," as our transla- 
tors render it. And the only difference between them, which 
he assigns, is, that the badh (being derived from *n2 badhadh, 
solus) was made of a single thread, and the shesh (which word 

rum manicee pertinebant ad volam manus, et pro latitudine manus patebant.' 7 
See other testimonies apud Braunium de Vestitu Sacerd. lib. ii. cap. ii. sect, 
vii. p. 461, edit. 1680, sect, cccxli. p. 372, edit. 1701. 
* Temple Service, chap. iii. 

f Vid. Cunaeum de Repub. Hebr. lib. ii. cap. i.; et Leusden. Philol. 
Hebr. mixt. dissert, xxvii. p. 179, 180. 

L 2 



J 4* 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BO OK 



signifies six) was composed of several, perhaps six, threads 
twisted together. He supports this sentiment by the testi- 
mony of Maimonides, and various other Jewish doctors.* 

The third garment was the to:nx abntt, or girdle; Exod. 
xxviii. 40. This was likewise made of the shhh, or fine 
twined linen, and curiously embroidered with a variety of co- 
lours ; Exod. xxxix. 29. Mpses has not acquainted us either 
with the length or breadth of this girdle. But Josephus and 
the rabbies have given us the measure of it, though their ac- 
counts are very different. It went, according to Josephus, 
tw T ice about the waist.f But Maimonides makes it to be 
thirty-two ells long. J If this account be true, the use of it 
seems to have been, not only to bind the tunic close and 
tight, but to serve for a warm upper garment, by swathing 
the body from the arms to the waist ; and also to strengthen 
the back for the laborious w T ork of killing, dressing, and burn- 
ing the sacrifices. However, Josephus's account seems the 
more probable; partly, because so warm a dress would, in 
that warm climate, have been highly inconvenient, especially 
when they were engaged in the most laborious part of their 
employment, or were tending the fire on the altar ; and partly, 
because in the visionary appearance of Christ in the priest's 
habit, referred to before, he is said to be " girt about the 
paps with a golden girdle :" an expression which renders it 
unlikely that the greater part of his body was swathed with 
it; rather intimating, that it was tied once or twice about the 
breast. Josephus informs us,§ that it w r as tied in a knot before, 
the ends of it hanging down for ornament to the feet ; but 
that when the priest was about any work, which obliged him 
to stoop, and the ends of the girdle w r ould be in his way, he 
threw them over his left shoulder. Maimonides makes the 
breadth of the girdle to be three fingers, || Josephus four ; 

* Vid. Braun. de Vestitu Sacerd. Hebr. lib. i. cap. ii. sect. iii. p. 23 — 25, 
edit. Amstel. 1680; alias, sect. xvii. — xix. p. 17 — 19, edit. 1701 ; cap. vi. 
sect. viii. p. 131 — 134, edit. 1680; sect. xcii. xciii. p. 101 — 103, edit. 
1701; cap. vii. sect. i. — iv. p. 137 — 141, edit. 1680; sect. xcv. — xcviii. 
p. 105 — 109, edit. 1701. 

f Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. ii. torn. i. p. 140, edit. Haverc. 

I De Apparatu Templi, cap. viii. sect. xix. apud Crenii Fascicul. Sex- 
turn, p. 146, 147. 

§ Antiq. ubi supra. || Maimon. ubi supra. 



(HAP. V.] GARMENTS OE THE PRIESTS. 



149 



and he adds, that it was wove hollow, like a snake's skin, 
and so served for a purse, as well as a girdle ; # to which use, 
indeed, in ancient times girdles were commonly applied both 
among the Jews and Romans. Hence Horace saith, " Ibit 
e6, quo vis, qui zonam perdidit/'t And " zonam perdere" 
is a Latin phrase for being a bankrupt. And hence also, 
when our Saviour sent out his disciples to preach, he enjoined 
them to " provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass, ug tuq 
ZnjvaQ, in their purses," or girdles; Matt. x. 9. 

The fourth garment was rujDJO migbangnoth, the bonnet, 
or bonnets, as we render the word, Exod. xxviii. 40. It was 
also made of the WW shesh, or fine twined linen; Exod. xxxix. 
28. The Scripture is wholly silent, both as to the fashion of 
it, and the quantity of linen that composed it. According to 
the rabbies' description of it, it was much like the Turkish tur- 
ban : they say, it consisted of a slip of linen sixteen ells long, 
wound round the head.! Josephus saith, it was like a helmet 
made of linen, one wreath being plaited and folded over ano- 
ther, and a thin cap, suited to the shape of it, put over all, to 
prevent its unfolding or growing slack. § 

The high-priest's head dress is indeed expressed by another 
word, which we render a mitre; but the Jews reckon the 
mitre and the bonnet to be the same, only folded up in a 
somewhat different manner, according to the dignity of the 
person that wore it. They describe the mitre, as wound into 
a broader and more beautiful form, like the Turkish turban ; 
whereas the bonnet was made into a more conical figure, 
though not into a point like the Persian turban; and this is 
what Josephus means, when he calls the bonnet aKU)vov.\\ 

The sacerdotal vestments, peculiar to the high-priest, were 
the robe, the ephod, the breastplate, and the holy crown. 
These are commonly called the vestes aurece, to distinguish 

* Joseph, ubi supra. f Epistolamm, lib. ii. epist. ii. 1. 40. 

X Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. viii. sect. ii. et xix. p. 140, 141, et 
146, apud Crenii Fascicul. Sext. Vid. Braunium de Vestitu Sacerd. lib. ii. 
cap. iv. sect. xi. xii. p. 512, 513, edit. 1680; sect, ccclxxxviii. ccclxxxix. 
p. 414, 415, edit. 1701. 

§ Ubi supra. 

|| Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. iii. torn. i. p. 141, edit. Haverc. Vid. 
Braunium de Vestitu Sacerd. lib. ii. cap. iv. sect. xiv. xv. edit. 1630; sect, 
cccxci. cccxcii. p. 418, et seq. edit. 1701 = 



150 



JEWISH A Is T IQUI UES. 



[BOOK I. 



them from the plain or linen garments,* already described ; 
for they were richly ornamented with gold and jewels. 

The first was the SyD mengnil, or blue robe, which was 
wore over the linen vest. We have the description of it in 
the book of Exodus : " And thou shalt make the robe of the 
ephod all of blue, and there shall be an hole in the top of it, 
in the midst thereof ; it shall have a binding of woven work, 
round about the hole of it, as it were the hole of an habergeon, 
that it be not rent. And beneath, upon the hem of it, thou 
shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet, 
round about the hem thereof, and bells of gold between them 
round about; a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell 
and a pomegranate, upon the hem of the robe round about," 
Exod. xxviii. 31 — 34. It is called the robe of the ephod, 
not only because it was wore along with, and next under it, 
but because, says Maimonides, it was girded with the ephod ;f 
that is, the girdle of the ephod served for this robe as well 
as for the ephod itself, and bound these two garments, toge- 
ther, to the body. It is not certain of what stuff this robe 
was made; but as it was coloured, it is not probable it was 
linen ; because that takes the dye the worst of any sort of 
stuff of which garments are made. Some, therefore, will have 
it to be made of wool, others of cotton : the Syriac version, 
and after it the old Flemish, make it to be yellow silk. But 
as to the colour, though we are not very certain of the mean- 
ing of the Hebrew word nbm techeleth, yet it seems reasonable 
to follow the Septuagint, which renders it hyacinth ; and so 
does the Chaldee Paraphrase. What occasions the uncer- 
tainty in this case is, that there is both a stone and a flower 
called the hyacinth ; the stone yellow, and the flower blue. 
But cpnsidering that the ephod, which was wore over the 
upper part of this robe, was embroidered with scarlet and 
gold, and that golden bells hung at the bottom of the robe 
itself, it is more likely that the colour was that of the 
hyacinth flower than that of the stone, since the gold 
and scarlet would show to more advantage on blue than on 
yellow ; and therefore, we translate the word nbm techeleth, 
blue. 

* Maimon de Apparaiu Templi, cap. viii. ab init. 

f Ubi supra, cap. x. sect. iii. p. 154, Crenii Fascic. Sext. 



CHAP. V.] 



GARMENTS OF THE PRIESTS. 



151 



Round the bottom of this robe, in the manner of a fringe, 
there were little golden bells, and balls of blue, purple, and 
scarlet, in the shape of pomegranates, which hung interchange- 
ably. We are not informed in the Scripture of the number or 
size either of the bells or pomegranates. But the rabbies, 
who are not content to be supposed ignorant of any thing, 
have supplied both these defects; assuring us, that the num- 
ber of each was just seventy-two,* the number of the elders 
of Israel ; and that each pomegranate was as large as an egg.f 
Now since the bells, in order to their making a becoming and 
graceful appearance, must be supposed to be as large as the 
pomegranates, and likewise allowing a proper space between 
each bell and pomegranate, for the sounding of the bells, one 
cannot well admit less room than a nail of a yard, or two 
inches and a quarter, for each ; which, multiplied by the whole 
number of bells and pomegranates, amounts to one hundred 
forty-four nails, or nine yards : an incredible circumference in- 
deed, about double the size of a modern hoop petticoat! 

This robe is said by Josephus,± and the rabbies,§ to be 
without sleeves, having a hole on each side, to put the arms 
through. Moses describes it as having a hole at the top, to 
put the head through ; and saith, that this hole had a strong- 
binding round it, to prevent its being rent, in putting it on and 
off; Exod. xxviii. 32. 

This hole in the top of the robe is expressed in the Hebrew 
by ity*n phi-roshu, the mouth of his head; or through 
which the priest put his head ; or by SyDPMD phi-hammengnil, 
the mouth, or hole, of the robe ; Exod. xxxix. 23. This will 
explain what is meant by the Psalmist, when he describes the 
precious ointment, that was poured on Aaron's head, as run- 
ning down c * to the skirts of his garment," ^JTHD-^D phi-mid- 
dothaiv, Psalm cxxxiii. 2; the mouth, or collar of his robe; as 
our translators have rendered the word phi in another place, 

* Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. iv. p. 148, Crenii Fascic. Sexti. 

f R. S. Jarchi ad Exod. xxviii. 31 ; vid. ejus verba apud Braun. de 
Vestit. Sacerd. lib. ii. cap. v. sect, xviii. p. 565, 566, edit. 1680; sect, 
ccccxxii. p. 453, edit. 1701. 

i This is undoubtedly the meaning of the following words in Josephus ; 
kcu o&eu ai x«p« SieipyoVTai, <rx"rTos evriv, etiam aperta est, qua manus exse- 
runtur. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. iv. torn. i. p. 142, edit. Haverc. 

§ Maimon. ubi supra, sect. iii. 



152 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Job. xxx. 18, and Ains worth in this; agreeable to which is 
Bishop Patrick's paraphrase. I can see no foundation, there- 
fore, for that very disagreeable idea, suggested by the irenera- 
lity of our metrical translators, not excepting even the inge- 
nious Dr. Watts : that the oil was poured in so profuse a 
quantity on Aaron's head, as to descend, not only upon his 
beard, but to the bottom of his clothes : which, indeed, it is 
not probable God would have directed to be made in so 
expensive and beautiful a manner, if they had been designed 
to be smeared with oil, and thereby to be utterly spoiled. 

I take the case to be, that the hair of his head and beard 
was to be well anointed to the extremity, which probably 
reached as low as the collar of his robe. This was graceful 
and ornamental, according to the fashion of that country, and 
those times. Hence we read, not only of w wine that maketh 
glad the heart of man, but of oil to make his face to shine," 
Psalm civ. 15, or his outside; for so DKD pamm frequently 
signifies, in opposition to his heart : referring probably to the 
anointing the hair, w hich was then the fashion. Hence it is, 
likewise, that David, among other expressions of the plenty 
and glory of the state, to which God had advanced him, par- 
ticularly mentions his anointing his head with oil, Psalm 
xxiii. 5. It was a mark of the gaiety and luxury of men of plea- 
sure, that they " anointed themselves with the chief oint- 
ments," Amos vi. 6. The same custom continued to our 
Saviour's time, as is evident from a certain woman's pouring 
the precious ointment on his head, when he w 7 as entertained 
at the house of Simon the leper, Matt. xxvi. 7 ; and from the 
gentle reproof which our Lord gave Simon the Pharisee, on 
an occasion of the like nature, for omitting that common act 
of civility: Luke vii. 46. On the whole, beside the mystical 
intention of the sacerdotal unction, it was designed, as the 
garments themselves were, " for glory and for beauty," 
Exod. xxviii. 2; which it could not have been, if they had 
been thereby daubed and spoiled. 

It may perhaps be objected, that if these beautiful vest- 
ments were not defaced by the anointing, they must, how- 
ever, have been grievously defiled with the sprinkling of blood 
and oil upon them, which was one ceremony prescribed and ob- 
served at the consecration of the high-priest: Exod. xxix. 21. 



CHAP. V.] 



GARMENTS OF THE 



PRIESTS. 



153 



But as to this, let it be remarked, that the English word 
sprinkle is used by our translators for two Hebrew words, 
pnr zarak, and n?3 nazah, as different from each other in 
sense as they are in sound. The former denotes sprinkling 
in a large quantity; as when Moses is commanded to take 
" handfuls of the ashes of the furnace, and sprinkle them 
toward heaven," Exod.ix. 8; and when, in Ezekiel's vision, 
the man clothed in linen is ordered to "fill his hand with 
coals of fire, and scatter, or sprinkle, them over the city;" 
Ezek. x. 2. Again, this word is applied to such a sprinkling, 
or rather pouring of clean water as should cleanse the persons 
on whom it was poured from all their filthiness, Ezek. xxxvi. 
25; which seems to imply a considerable quantity. It is the 
word used for sprinkling the blood of the sacrifices round 
about upon the altar, Lev. vii. 2; Exod. xxix. 16; which 
implies, that no inconsiderable proportion of it was disposed 
of in that manner, which was afterward dried and consumed 
by the fire. 

The other word ni3 nazah, is used for sprinkling in a small 
quantity ; as when a man dips the end of his finger in some 
liquor, and with that sprinkles a drop or two upon any thing. 
Thus, in performing the rites of cleansing a leper, the priest is 
ordered to pour oil into the palm of his left hand, and to sprin- 
kle some of it with his right finger; Lev. xiv. 26, 27. Again, 
" the priest shall dip his finger in the blood, and sprinkle seven 
times before the Lord ;" Lev. iv. 6. In the same manner was 
the high-priest to sprinkle the blood of the sacrificed bullock 
upon the mercy-seat ; Lev. xvi. 14. It is not surely to be 
imagined, that he was to throw any considerable quantity of 
blood upon it, to defile and deface that beautiful piece of 
carvino* and the curious images of the chembim. He was 
only, with the tip of his finger, just to spot it seven times, and 
probably in a part where it could be easily wiped off. Now, 
this is the word used for the sprinkling of Aaron's garments; 
which, I think, may be considered as the setting God's mark 
upon them, perhaps by a spot in one particular place ; which 
would no more deface their beauty, than one black letter 
would sully a clean cambric handkerchief. 

But to return to the SyD mengnil, or blue robe, which was 
put on over the head, and covered the body all round ; but 



154 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



how low it reached the Scripture no where informs us. The 
Septuagint calls it vtto^vttjv wod^pr}, and Josephus irodriprig;* 
which means, that it reached down to the feet. But the 
length which we commonly see expressed in the pictures of 
the high-priest, to about the middle of the leg, is probably 
the true one ; because, otherwise, the tunica ocellata would 
have been quite hid by it. Besides, this would be more con- 
venient for the sounding of the bells which hung on the bot- 
tom of it, than if it came quite down to the feet. 

The second of the aurecz vestes was the ephod, so called 
from 1DN aphad, amicivit or accinxit ; which verb we render 
to gird and to bind, in the only two places wherein it occurs : 
Exod. xxix. 5; Lev. viii. 7. Ephod seems to have been the 
name of an upper garment which was worn by persons of dis- 
tinction of various characters. We read that king David, 
2 Sam. vi. 4, and the eighty-five priests who were murdered 
by Saul, 1 Sam. xxii. 18, and even Samuel, when a child, 
1 Sam. ii. 18, were girded with a linen ephod. It is there- 
fore probable, that the peculiarity of the high-priest's ephod 
did not consist in its being of a different shape from that 
which was worn by other persons ; but in the richness of the 
materials of which it was made, and the fine embroidery and 
jewels with which it was adorned. Insomuch that it might 
properly be called the ephod, kot ^o\r\v. 

The description of this garment in the book of Exodus, re- 
lates only to its materials, and not to its shape or form. It 
was made u of gold, of blue, and of purple, of scarlet, and 
fine twined linen with cunning work;" Exod. xxviii. 6, &c. 
We are not very certain concerning the nature of these 
colours. I have already given some account of the word 
rr^Dn techeleth, which we render blue. As for the p:nN«rgYz- 
man, or purple, as it is rendered, it is generally thought to be 
a dye made of the blood of a shell-fish of that name, which 
was taken on the coast of Palestine, and for which the Tyrians 
afterward became famous. f 

Some Jewish etymologists make )D.nN argaman, to be a 
kind of adjective of the word DJ"i regem, which, according to 
them, signifies a prince or a royal person ; wherefore they 

* Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. iv. torn. i. p. 142, edit. Haverc. 
f Vid. Bochart. Hieroz. part ii. lib. v. cap. x. and xi. 



IS HAP. V.] 



GARMENTS OF THE PRIESTS. 



155 



would translate it a princely colour, or such as kings wore 
themselves, and bestow T ed on their greatest favourites. Thus 
Daniel was clothed with purple by Belshazzar, Dan. v. 29. 

As for the shape of the ephod, the Septuagint calls it 
£7rwjutc, # which signifies that it w r as worn on the shoulders. 
Josephus saith, it was a cubit long.f St. Jerome compares it 
to the Roman caracalla, which was a sort of short cloak, only 
that it had a head or hood to it, something like the capuchins 
the ladies now wear, which the ephod had not.J Maimonides 
saith, it reached down to the feet ; which some suppose to be 
true of the back, though not of the forepart. It consisted, 
they imagine, of two parts, the one an oblong, rectangular 
piece, hanging down behind from the shoulders to the feet ; 
and the rabbies say, it was the breadth of his back who wore 
it from shoulder to shoulder ; the other a short rectangular 
piece, which hung down before, the length of a cubit. These 
two pieces were joined together, upon the shoulders, with 
some proper fastening, as loops, buttons, or the like.§ 

The high-priest's ephod had a very rich button upon each 
shoulder, made of a large onyx stone set in gold ; so large 
that the names of the twelve tribes of Israel were engraven, 
six upon each stone ; Exod. xxviii. 9 — 12. 

The word OTHV shoham, which we render onyx, the Septua- 
gint translates <j[iapay§og, an emerald. But we have no cer- 
tain knowledge, either of this, or of any of the twelve stones 
of the breast-plate, and may as well be satisfied with our 
translation as with any other. || 

To the ephod there belonged a curious girdle, of the same 
rich fabric with the ephod itself. This is said to be " upon 
the ephod/' Exod". xxyiii. 8; that is, wove with it, as Maimo- 
nides understands it ; and coming out from it on each side, 

* And so Josephus, Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. vi. Oper. torn. i. p. 150. 
t Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. v. p. 143, edit. Haverc. 
% Hieron. ad. Fabiolam, epist. cxxviii. 

§ Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. ix. sect. ix. p. 150, Crenii Fascicul. 
Sext. 

|| Braunius hath considered the subject at large, de Vestitu Sacerd. He- 
braeor. lib. ii. a cap. viii. ad xix. inclusive p. 497 — 588, edit. 1701. See 
likewise Epiphanius de xii Gemmis ; Buxtorf the Younger, in his Exercitat. 
de Area Foederis ; and Christ. Cartwright. Elect. Targum. Rabbin, in loc. 



156 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 



it was brought under the arms like a sash, and tied upon the 
breast.* Upon the ephod was put, 

3dly. The tDDTO ]Z*n chosheii mishpat, "the breast-plate 
of judgment," Exod. xxviii. 15; so called, because the high- 
priest always wore it when he consulted the oracle, by which 
were determined all doubtful cases of national importance. 
The breast-plate was made of the same rich materials with the 
ephod, two spans long, and one broad ; but, folding up double, 
it was a span square, ver. 16.+ The breast-plate was fastened 
upon the ephod by rings of gold at the four corners, the two 
upper rings being hung upon or fastened to the shoulder- 
pieces with golden chains, and the two lower rings tied to the 
girdle of the ephod with blue strings or ribands; Exod. xxviii. 
22 — 28. The breast-plate was adorned with four rows of 
jewels set in sockets of gold, three jewels in a row ; that is, 
in three perpendicular rows, and four horizontal. Upon these 
jewels were graven the names of the twelve patriarchs, one 
name upon each jewel; Exod. xxviii. 17 — 21. If our trans- 
lators have given us the right names of these stones, some of 
them are so hard (as particularly the diamond), that we might 
well wonder how they engraved them. But here the talmud- 
ists wonderfully help us, by assuring us, that they were not 
engraven with any tool, w T hich would have wasted some of the 
substance of these precious stones, but by a miraculous worm, 
not now in being, w hich, being set upon each of these stones, 
crept and sunk itself along those places wdiich Moses had 
marked out to it, and so impressed the letters upon the stones, 
as if it had been on soft wax, without taking off any part of 
it- J But as we do not pretend to know what, or how hard 
these stones were, we stand in no need of this miraculous 
worm to account for the difficulty of engraving them. 

The fourth garment, or rather ornament, peculiar to the 
high-priest, was the plate, or crown of gold, which he wore 
upon the front of his mitre ; Exod. xxviii. 36 — 38. This is 

* Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, ubi supra, et sect. xi. p. 152. 

t A span is half a cubit, as appears from Ezek. xliii. 13. 17, where in one 
verse it is said, that the border of the altar shall be a span ; in the other, 
that it shall be half a cubit. 

t Braun. de Vestitu Sacerdot. lib. ii. cap. vii. sect, cccclxvii. p. 490, edit. 
1701. 



CHAP. V.] GARMENTS OF THE PRIESTS. 



157 



likewise called " the holy crown," Exod. xxxix. 6; and the 
plate of the holy crown ; Exod. xxxix. 30. The Hebrew 
word pif tsits, which we translate a plate, properly signifies a 
flower. The Septuagint renders it irtrakov, which signifies a 
leaf, because, saith Ainsworth, it appeared fair and glorious. 
Or rather, perhaps, it is expressed by a word which signifies 
a flower or leaf, because it is thin, that so it might not be 
burdensome to wear. However, we must not conceive it to 
be near so thin as our leaf gold, because it had letters en- 
graven upon it, which leaf gold w r ill not admit of. The size 
and form of this plate or crown, are not expressed by Moses ; 
but, if the Jewish doctors are worthy of credit, it was two 
fingers broad, and made in a circular form, suited to the shape 
of the head ; and so long, that it reached from ear to ear, and 
was fastened upon a blue lace or riband, which was tied be- 
hind the head ;* and as this gold plate reached but about half 
round the head, the remaining part of the riband, which was 
not covered with it, as far as to the tying, was richly orna- 
mented with artificial flowers of embroidered work. This 
plate had the following motto engraved on it, mn^-!2np kod- 
hesli laihovah, which is rendered in our translation, agreeable 
to most of the ancient versions, " Holiness to the Lord." 
The manner of engraving this motto, is said to be " like the 
engraving of a signet." But whether that is to be understood 
that the letters were sunk as in a seal, or protuberant as in 
the impression ; as also, whether the two words were wrote 
in one line or two, are points which the Jewish doctors must 
be left to dispute and determine among themselves. 

It has been customary in other nations, as Braunius shows,f 
to write inscriptions on the crown of princes and heroes, to 
which there seems to be an allusion in that passage of the 
Revelation, where antichrist is described as a lewd woman, 
with an inscription on her forehead : " Mystery, Babylon the 
great, the mother of harlots, and the abominations of the 
earth ;" Rev. xvii. 5. However, I imagine the reference in this 
place is more especially to the Jewish high-priest, and to the 

* Maimon. de Apparatu Tenipli, cap. ix. sect. i. p. 147, Crenii Fascicui. 
Sect. ; et R. S. Jarchi in loc. 

f De Vestitu Sacerd. Hebrceor. lib. ii. cap. xxii. sect. xv. edit. AmsteL 
1680; sect, dclxx. p. 636, edit. 1701. 



158 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



inscription on his crown ; because this woman immediately 
before is said to be " arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, 
and decked with gold and precious stones," which were the 
colours and ornaments of his vestes aurea, or golden vest- 
ments. The description seems, therefore, to intimate, that 
the person was one who would assume the character of Pon- 
tifex Maximus. How applicable this is to the Pope, every 
one may perceive, who is not greatly prejudiced ; especially 
as the word Mysterium was formerly engraven on the papal 
crown. But when the Protestants began to remark its con- 
gruity to the forecited passage in the Revelation, Pope Julius 
the Third ordered a new crown to be made, on which, instead 
of the former motto, was engraven, Julius, Pontifex Maxi- 
mus* 

Josephus gives us the description of a more pompous crown, 
which, in his time, the high-priests wore over their mitre, on 
which was embossed the calyx, or cup of a flower, resembling 
that produced by a plant which the Greeks call voaicvafxog.f 
But since, according to the original institution, this was no 
part of the pontifical dress, it does not belong to our province 
particularly to consider it. Possibly this might be the crown 
which Alexander the Great presented to Jaddua, when he 
went out to meet him, and which was afterward worn on 
grand and solemn occasions, in like manner as persons wear 
medals presented to them by princes, as badges of honour. 

Thus have we considered the pontifical vestes aurece. To 
these, particularly to the breast-plate, belonged the Urim and 
Thummim : '"Thou shalt put in the breast-plate of judgment, 
the Urim and the Thummim ; and they shall be upon Aaron's 
heart, when he goeth in before the Lord ; and Aaron shall 
bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart 
before the Lord continually Exod. xxviii. 30. The words 
D>*TIN and D^DD Urim and Thummim signify lights and perfec- 
tions. The Septuagint renders them SriXojaiv and aX^uav, 
manifestation and truth. But what they mean, as applied to 
the pontifical breast-plate, is not easily ascertained. Moses 
having said little concerning them, hath left room for innume- 
rable conjectures, wherewith many pages, and whole volumes, 

* See Poli Synops. in loc. 

f Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. vii. torn. i. p. 154, edit. Haverc. 



CHAP, v.] 



URIM AND THUMMTM. 



159 



of later writers have been filled. And, after all, nothing is 
more pertinent than the following sentence of Rabbi Kimchi : 
" He is on the safest side," saith he, ** who frankly confesses 
his ignorance : so that we seem to need a priest to stand up 
with Urim and Thummim, to teach us what the Thummim 
were," alluding to Ezra ii. 63. 

We read of no commandment, or direction, given to Moses 
for the making of them ; he is only ordered to put them in the 
breast-plate : " Thou shalt put in the breast-plate of judg- 
ment the Urim and the Thummim;" Exod. xxviii. 30. There 
is no mention of them in the account of the making of Aaron's 
garments in the thirty-ninth chapter of Exodus ; only in that 
of clothing the high-priest in Leviticus, it is said, " He put 
the breast-plate upon him, also he put in the breast-plate the 
Urim and Thummim." From hence some of the Hebrew 
doctors conclude, they were not the work of any human ar- 
tificer, but of God himself.* The use of them was to inquire 
of God, and to receive an answer by them concerning his will. 
It is said, in the book of Numbers, that Eleazar the priest shall 
ask counsel for Joshua after the j udgment of Urim before the 
Lord; Numb, xxvii. 21. And when Saul "inquired of the 
Lord, the Lord answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by 
Urim, nor by the prophets;" 1 Sam. xxviii. 6. And when 
Moses blessed the tribes of Israel, of Levi he said, " Let thy 
Urim and Thummim be with thy Holy One ;" Deut. xxxiii. 8. 
The opinion concerning the Urim and Thummim, most gene- 
rally received among the Jews, is, that they were the twelve 
precious stones in the breast-plate, on which were engraven 
the names of the twelve tribes of Israel ; and that the oracle 
gave its answer to any question proposed, by causing such 
letters in them to shine with a superior lustre, or to appear 
prominent above the rest, as formed the words of the answer ; 
which, some say, the high-priest was by inspiration taught to 
spell, and dispose in their proper order ; though others main- 
tain the several letters shone or appeared prominent, not all 
together, but one after another, in the order which formed the 
words of the answer.f And whereas all the letters of the 

* Rabbi Bechai, quoted by Schickard, Jure Regio, cap. i. theor. ii. p, 19, 
20, edit. Carpzov. 

f Vid. Schickard. de Jure Regio, cap. i. theor. ii. p. 24, edit. Carpzov. But 



160 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK i . 



alphabet are not found in the names of the twelve tribes, the 
talmudists inform us, that the names of Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob, were likewise engraven over the name of Reuben ; 
and under that of Benjamin, the words rr* *>IDli^ shibhte-Jah, 
" the tribes of the Lord and by this means the alphabet 
was completed. Josephus, and some others, imagine the 
answer was returned by the stones of the breast-plate appear- 
ing with an unusual lustre, when it was favourable, or, in the 
conirary case, dim. # Others suppose the Urim and Thum- 
mim were something inclosed between the folding or doubling 
of the breast-plate ; which, they say, was doubled for that 
very purpose, that it might be fit, as a purse, to contain them. 
What they were, is, however, differently conjectured. Some 
of the rabbies will have them to be the Tetragrammaton, or 
the word rPi*l* Jehovah, which, they say, was wrote in a mys- 
terious manner in two parts, and two different ways. f Chris- 
tophorus de Castro, and after him Dr. Spencer,J maintain 
them to be two little images, shut up in the doubling of the 
breast-plate, which gave the oracular answer from thence by 
an articulate voice. They accordingly derive them from the 
Egyptians, who consulted their Lares, and had an oracle, or 
Teraphim, which they called Truth : which, however, it is more 
likely they borrowed from the Jews, than the Jews from them. 

This conceit of Dr. Spencer's has been so abundantly con- 
futed by Dr. Pocock,§ that it does not appear to have been 

Scheringham, on the Mishnical book Joma, cap. viii. sect. v. not. xi. p. 251, 
252, saith, that Schickard was mistaken in supposing it the opinion of the 
rabbies, that the letters shone, or became prominent, in the order which 
composed the words of the answer; but that their notion was, that by an 
audible divine voice pronouncing the words, the high-priest was prevented 
from mistaking either the order of the letters, which were, or the points 
which were not engraven on the breast-plate. See likewise Carpzov. ad 
Schickard. 

* Antiq. lib. iii. cap. viii. sect. ix. Op. torn. i. p. 164. 
f Vid. It. Solomon, et Targum Jonathan, citat a. Schickard. Jure Regio, 
cap. i. theor. ii. p. 20, 21. 

X Vid. Dissert, de Urim et Thummim. 

§ Comment, on Hosea, chap. iii. 4 ; see likewise Witsius's Egyptiaca, in 
the first book and eighth chapter of which learned performance he hath 
given an account of Spencer's hypothesis, and in the second book, the 
third, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth chapters, a distinct and accurate confuta- 
tion of it. 



CHAP. V.] 



URTM AND THUMMIM. 



161 



adopted by any since his time. The more common opinion 
among Christians concerning the oracle by Urim and Thum- 
mim, and which Dr. Prideaux espouses,* is, that when the 
high-priest appeared before the veil, clothed with his ephod 
and breast-plate, to ask counsel of God, the answer was 
given by an audible voice from the mercy-seat within the veil : 
which, he thinks, best answers to the Scripture expression of 
" inquiring at the mouth of the Lord," Josh. ix. 14; and 
God's " communing" and talking with those who consulted 
him; Exod. xxv. 22. But this account will by no means 
agree with the history of David's consulting the oracle by 
Abiathar: when he knew " Saul secretly practised mischief 
against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, Bring hither the 
ephod;" and then he inquired of the Lord, " Will the men 
of Keilah deliver me up into his hands?" 1 Sam. xxiii. 9 — 1 1 . 
And on another occasion, " I pray thee," said he to Abiathar, 
" bring me hither the ephod : and he brought the ephod : and 
David inquired at the Lord, Shall I pursue after this troop?" 
&c, chap. xxx. 7, 8. On both the occasions, the ephod being 
used in consulting the oracle, it is concluded the answer was 
given by Urim : and that could not be by a voice from the 
mercy-seat upon the ark, the ark being then at Kirjath-jearim, 
a city in the tribe of Judah, 1 Sam. vii. 1, 2: whereas David 
and Abiathar were in the forest of Hareth the first time of con- 
sulting the oracle, 1 Sam. xxii. 5; and at Ziklag, in the countrv 
of the Philistines, the second, chap. xxix. 11, and xxx. 1. 

I will only mention one opinion more on this subject, that 
which is espoused and supported by the learned Braunius. 
He supposes, that when Moses is commanded to put in the 
breast-plate the Urim and Thummim, which words are in the 
plural number, and signify lights and perfections, it means 
only that he should make choice of the most perfect set of 
stones, and have them so polished as to give the brightest and 
finest lustre -t This is likewise the notion of Hottinger.J 
And on this supposition, the use and design of the Urim and 

* See his Connect, part i. book iii. sub anno 535 ante Christ. 

f See the reasons with which he supports this opinion, in his treatise De 
Vestitu Sacerd. Hebraeor. lib. ii. cap. xx. sect, xviii. — xxi. p. 786 — 773, 
Arastel. 1680; sect, dcxxxi. — dcxxxv. p. 605 — 610, edit. 1701. 

| Vid. Hotting, annot, in Godw. Mosen et Aaron, lib. i. cap. v. not. 11, 

M 



162 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES, 



[BOOK [. 



Thummim, or of these exquisitely polished jewels in the pec- 
toral, was only to be a symbol of the Divine presence, and of 
the light and perfection of the prophetic inspiration; and, as 
such, constantly to be worn by the high-priest in the exercise 
of his sacred function, especially in consulting the oracle.* 

Amidst this great variety of sentiments, we may indulge 
this consolatory reflection, that if a more clear and certain 
knowledge of this subject had been necessary or useful, the 
Scripture account, beyond all question, would have been more 
distinct and particular .f 

Having described the sacerdotal vestments, it only remains 
that I add a few general remarks concerning them. 

1st. The priests wore these garments only when they offici- 
ated ; at other times it does not appear they were distinguished 
by their habits from other men. J It is said, these vestments 
" shall be upon Aaron and upon his sons, when they come in 
unto the tabernacle of the congregation, or when they come 
near unto the altar to minister in the holy place ;" Exod. xxviii. 
43. And again, they are styled " the clothes of service, to do 
service in the holy place ; and the holy garments for Aaron 
the priest, and his sons' garments, to minister in the priest's 
office;" chap, xxxix. 41. Accordingly, Josephus, speaking of 
the priests, saith, they w r ere habited like the common people ; 
adding, he only who ministers wears the sacred vestments. § 
It is reasonably supposed, that some of the " chambers built 
round about against the wall of the temple," 1 Kings vi. 5, 
were vestries, in which the priests dressed for their ministry, 
and laid up the sacred vestments when the service was over. 
This is conformed by the following passage in Ezekiel's vision 

* Braun. de Vestitu, ubi supra, sect. xxv. — xxvii. p. 778 — 782, edit. 
Amstel. 1680; sect. dcxl. — dcxliii. p. 613 — 617, edit. 1701. 

f S&8 on this subject Lightfoot's Handful of Gleanings upon Exod. sect, 
xlviii. ; Buxtorf, in his Exercitat. de Area Foederis; Schickard. Jus Regium 
Hebraeor. cum annot. Carpzov. cap. i. theor. iii. p. 17 — 46; and Shering- 
ham in Joma apud Mishna Surenhusii, cap. viii. sect. v. not. xi. torn. ii. . 
p. 251, 252. 

t Vid. Selden. de Success, in Pontif. lib. ii. cap. vii. Oper. vol. ii. p. 183, 
praesertim de Synedr. lib. iii. cap. ii. sect. iii. Op. vol. i. torn. ii. p. 1689 — 
1711. 

§ Vid. Joseph, de Bell. Jud. lib. v. cap. v. sect, vii. ; and Selden's ob- 
servations on the passage, in his Treatise de Synedr. ubi supra, p. 1711. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACERDOTAL VESTMENTS. 



163 



of the temple and the holy service : u When they go forth 
into the outer court, even into the court of the people, they 
shall put off their garments, wherein they ministered, and lay 
them in the holy chambers ; and they shall put on other gar- 
ments;"' Ezek. xliv. 19. This remark, perhaps, may furnish 
us with the best account of Paul's not knowing the hioh- 
priest, Ananias, when he appeared before him in the Sanhe- 
drim, Acts xxiii. 5; because, being not engaged in any duty 
of his ministerial function, he had not on his pontifical robes, 
nor was distinguished by any particular habit: and as in 
those times the high-priest was often changed by the Roman 
power, so as rather to have become an annual officer, than, as 
he ought to have been according to the law of Moses, one for 
life, and as Paul was now grown a stranger at Jerusalem, it 
is very probable he might never have seen him before ; or, if 
he had, in his pontifical robes in the temple, where he had 
lately attended for seven days successively, Acts xxi. 27, he 
might not have taken such particular notice of his person, as 
readily to know him again in another place and another 
dress. This I take to be an easier solution than to render 
ovk ?]§£tv (as some do), " I acknowledge him not to be high- 
priest/' on account of his procuring the office by corruption 
and bribery ; or to suppose, with Dr. Whitby, that the same 
prophetic impulse which had moved him to utter that pro- 
phecy against him, " God shall smite thee, thou whited wall," 
Acts xxiii. 3, did not suffer him to consider, just at that time, 
that it was the high-priest to whom he spoke. 

Godwin saith, the high-priest might not wear his sacred 
garments abroad in the city, unless on some urgent occasion; 
as when Simeon the Just went forth to meet Alexander. But 
his name, according to Josephus, was not Simeon the Just, 
but Jaddua,* his grandfather.f 

2dly. The sacerdotal vestments were provided at the ex- 
pense, not of the priests, but of the people.! As for the 

■ * Antiq. lib. xi. cap. viii. sect. iv. v. torn. i. p. 580 — 582; see also an 
account of the affair in Prideaux's Connect, part i. book vii. sub anno 332 
ante Christ. 

f Compare Joseph. Antiq. ubi supra, sect. vii. p. 582, with lib. xii. cap. ii. 
sect iv. p. 589. 

X Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. viii. sect. vii. p. 142, Crenii 
Fascic. Sext. 

M 2 



164 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book T. 



pontifical vestes aurea, which were exceeding rich and costly, 
they are supposed to have been provided out of the public 
treasury; and the other sacerdotal garments, either the same 
way, or by free-will offerings. We are told, Ezra ii. 68, 69, 
that when some of the chief of the fathers came to see the 
temple, which w T as rebuilding after the captivity, they gave 
according to their ability unto the treasure of the work, 
not only gold and silver, but a hundred priests' garments. 
Again, the Tirshatha (or Nehemiah the governor) gave to 
the treasury (beside gold and silver there mentioned), five 
hundred and thirty priests' garments, Xehem. vii. 70: and 
the rest of the people gave sixty-seven, ver. 72. 

The Talmudists and Maimonides sav. that all free-will 
offerings of that sort must be o-iven to the whole congregation, 
that is, to the officers who managed its concerns; insomuch 
that if the mother of a priest brought her son a garment, it 
was to be given, not to him, but to them,* and thev might 
assign the use of it to whom they pleased. Indeed, it does 
not seem likely the sacerdotal garments should be the property 
of particular priests, and worn by them only: especially when 
the priests were divided, as they were in David's time, into 
twenty-four courses, and each inferior priest officiated at the 
temple only a fortnight in a year. They were designed there- 
fore for the common use of the priests, as thev came in their 
turns to minister. 

Sdly. The rabbies say, that when the garments of the 
inferior priests were grown foul, they were not washed, but 
cut into shreds, to make wicks for the lamps of the sanctuary ; 
and when the high-priest's vestments were left off, they were 
put to no farther use, but hid in some secret place. i- But of 
this the Scripture says nothing. 

4thly. You will observe, that neither the high-priest, nor 
those of the lower order, wore any thing, either on their 
hands or feet, while they were employed in their ministry. 
There is no garment assigned to either in any Scripture cata- 

* Gemar. Hierosolym. tit. Shek. cap. iv. ; see this, and a quotation from 
the Babj'lonian Gemara, and from Mainionides, in Braunius de Yestitu. 
lib. ii. cap. xxiv. sect. xv. p. 839, edit. Amstel. 1680; cap. xxv. sect, dccviii. 
p. 667, edit. 1701. 

t Vid. Braun. ubi supra, cap. xxv. sect. xi. p. 858 — 861, edit. Amstel. 
1680; cap. xxvi. sect, dccxx. p. 682, 683, edit. 1701. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACERDOTAL VESTMENTS, 



165 



logue. The sacrificial services, in which the priests were chiefly 
employed, would not conveniently admit of their wearing gloves ; 
and in public worship, to be barefoot seems to have been 
reckoned a token of reverence even before the giving of the 
law : for when God appeared to Moses in the bush, he com- 
manded him to " put his shoes from off his feet, because the 
place whereon he stood was holy ground Exod. iii. 5. In 
those days this was a usual token of reverence during divine 
worship, when men considered themselves as in the more im- 
mediate presence of God. It was fit, therefore, Moses 
should express the same kind of religious veneration in a 
place which God, by manifesting himself in so extraordinary 
a manner, was pleased to render, pro tempore, a temple or 
holy place. For the same reason, Joshua is commanded to 
pay the like homage before the " captain of the host of the 
Lord/' Josh. v. 15, who was undoubtedly " the angel of God's 
presence, in whom his name is," even the divine Aoyog ; for it 
is said, Joshua " fell on his face to the earth, and worshipped 
him ver. 14. This we cannot suppose he would have done 
if he had esteemed him only a created angel ; or that, if he 
had done it, his worship would not have met with such a 
rebuke as the angel gave to St. John, — " See thou do it not ; 
for I am thy fellow servant : worship God Rev. xxii. 9. 
The Jewish priests, according to the rabbies, were required to 
be superstitiously exact in this ceremony ; for if any thing in- 
tervened between their feet and the ground, they imagined 
their ministry would be null and invalid . # 

It may not be improper here to remark, that as the Jews 
accounted it a token of reverence to have their feet bare in 
public worship, so likewise to have their heads covered. This 
was accordingly the practice, not only of the priests but of the 
people, as at this day it is, in token of their modesty and 
humility, and of their accounting themselves unworthy to look 
up in the more immediate presence of God. Thus, on the 
Divine appearance to Moses in the bush, it is said, " he hid 
his face, for he was afraid to look upon God Exod. iii. 6, 
And on the extraordinary manifestation of the Divine presence 

* Vid. Mish. tit. Zebhac. cap. ii. sect. i. ; R. Bartenor. et Mairnon. in 
loc. torn. v. p. 10, edit. Surenhus. ; et Maimon. de Ratione adeundi Tern- 
pli ; cap. v. sect. xvii. xix. p. 202, 203, Crenii Fasciculi Sexti. 



166 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



to Elijah, he " wrapped his face in his mantle 1 Kings xix. 
13. On the same account, perhaps, the angels were repre- 
sented in vision to Isaiah, as covering their faces with their 
wings in the presence of Jehovah, Isa. vi. 2; to have the 
head uncovered, being esteemed a mark of confidence. For 
which reason, in those places where the Israelites are said to 
have " marched out of Egypt with a high hand," the Chaldee 
Paraphrast renders it " bareheaded," that is, with boldness 
and intrepidity. 

The ancient Romans, likewise, performed their sacred rites 
with a veil or covering on their heads, as appears from these 
lines in Virgil : — 

Quin, ubi transmissae steterint trans aequora classes, 
Et positis aris jam vota in littore solves ; 
Purpureo velare comas adopertus amictu : 
Ne qua inter sanctos ignes in honore Deorum 
Hostilis facies occurrat, et omina turbet. 

iEneid, in. 1. 403, &c. 

Again, 

Spes est pacis, ait. Turn numina sancta precamur 
Palladis armisonae, quae prima accepit ovantes : 
Et capita ante aras Phrygio velamur amictu. 

Ibid. L 543, &c. 

The Grecians, on the contrary, performed the sacred rites 
bareheaded. " Illic (nempe in aede Saturni) Grseco ritu, ca- 
pite aperto, res divina fit," saith Macrobius.* St. Paul, 
therefore, writing to the Corinthians, who were Greeks, de- 
clares, that " every man praying or prophesying, with his 
head covered, dishonoureth his head," 1 Cor. xi. 4; thereby 
teaching us, that though the circumstances of dress, as well 
as gesture, in divine worship, are in themselves indifferent ; 
yet such are proper to be used, as the custom of the country 
where we dwell has rendered significative of humility and re- 
verence. 

5thly. The sacerdotal vestments are all supposed to have 
a moral and typical signification, though the more immediate 
design of them, especially of the pontifical vestes aureot, was 
" for glory and for beauty ;" Exod. xxviii. 2. For the whole 
ceremonial worship had et a shadow of good things to come," 



* Saturnal. lib. i. cap. viii, p. 222, 223, edit. Gronov, Lugd. Bat. 1670= 



CHAP. V.J SACERDOTAL VESTMENTS. 



167 



Heb. x. 1 ; and it is said of the priests in particular, that they 
served unto the example and shadow of heavenly things/' 
chap. viii. 5. Concerning the typical and spiritual meaning 
of these vestments, as pretty commonly represented by Chris- 
tians, consult Mather's sermon on this subject in his "Types 
Unveiled." As for the Jews, they discover a world of phi- 
losophy in them. Josephus # makes the high-priest's linen 
garment represent the body of the earth ; the glorious robe, 
heaven ; the bells and pomegranates, thunder and lightning. 
Or otherwise, the ephod of various colours is the universe ; 
the breast-plate, the earth in its centre ; the girdle, the sea ; 
the onyx stone on each shoulder, the sun and moon ; the 
twelve stones in the breast-plate, the twelve signs of the 
zodiac, or the twelve months in the year ; the mitre, heaven ; 
and the golden plate with the name of God engraven on it, 
the splendour of the Divine Majesty in heaven. Philo philo- 
sophises on them in a similar manner.^ 

But the talmudical doctors assign them a more religious 
and moral signification ; the eight garments denoting circum- 
cision, which was to be performed on the eighth day ; and 
each garment being to expiate a particular sin — the breeches, 
uncleanness ; the girdle, theft ; the ephod, idolatry ; the 
breast- plate, perverse judgment; the bells, evil speaking; 
the mitre, and the golden plate on the forehead, pride and 
impudence 4 

The Cocceian divines, who have great talents at allego- 
rizing, find out in them, in a manner, all spiritual blessings 
and graces. Braunius, in particular, makes the mitre signify 
wisdom ; the robe, righteousness ; the breeches, sanctifica- 
tion ; and the girdle, redemption : all which " Christ is made 
of God unto believers 1 Cor. i. 30. By the other vest- 
ments are denoted the principal benefits of the gospel ; elec- 
tion and adoption, by the ephod and the pectoral ; vocation, 

* Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vii. sect. ult. torn. i. p. 156, 157, edit. Haverc. 

f Philo. Jud. de Somniis, apud Opera, p. 463, 464; de Vita Mosis, lib. 
iii. p. 518 — 521 ; de Monarch, lib. ii. p. 636, 637, edit. Colon. Allobr. 
1613. 

I Vid. Braun. de Vestitu Sacerd. Hebraeor. lib. ii. cap. xxvi. sect. ix. x. 
p. 878 — 881, edit. Amstel. 1680; cap. xxvii. sect, dccxlv. dccxlvi. p. 707 
—709, edit. 1701. 



168 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



or effectual calling, by the bells ; faith, by the golden crown, 
&c. # These divines, as well as some of the ancients, have 
permitted their fancies to make excursions beyond the bounds 
of reason and good sense. Nevertheless, those who will ad- 
mit of no typical meaning in any of these things, go into a 
contrary extreme. It will be happy, if we can hit the just 
medium, in attempting which the Scripture will be our best 
guide. 

Three rites of the consecration, both of the high-priest and 
the common priests, their washing, anointing, and clothing, 
being considered, there remains a 

4th. The offering certain sacrifices according to the pre- 
scription in the book of Exodus, chap. xxix. These were a 
young bullock and two rams, beside unleavened bread, cakes, 
and wafers, ver. 1, 2; the bullock for a sin-offering, one ram 
for a burnt-offering, both which were entirely consumed with 
fire, ver. 13, 14. 18 : and the other ram and the bread in the 
nature of a peace-offering, part only of which was consumed 
on the altar, and the rest eat by the priests, for whom the 
sacrifices were offered, ver. 19 — 28. 

The first of these sacrifices, which was the sin-offering, was 
to signify, that till their sins were expiated, they were not fit 
to perform any acceptable service, much less to offer sacrifice, 
or make atonement for the sins of the people. 

The second, which was the holocaust, or whole burnt- 
offering, was in the nature of a gift or present, whereby they 
were recommended to God. 

The third was a peace-offering, on which they made a feast, 
and by that were initiated into his family .+ 

The ram of the peace-offering is called in the Hebrew 
Dwbft eil milluim, aries impletionum, ver. 22 : which Ains- 
worth renders the " ram of filling the hand ;" because " the 
part which was to be consumed on the altar, was first put into 
the hands of Aaron, and into the hands of his sons/' ver. 24. 

Rabbi Solomon gives a different reason for the ram's being- 
called D>K^D eil milluim, from nVd male, plenus vel com- 
pletus est; because the offering of this sacrifice completed 

* Ubi supra, sect. xvi. xvii. p. 887 — 889, edit. Amstel. 1680; sect, 
dccliii. dccliv. p. 713—715, edit 1701. 
f See Patrick on Exod. xxix. 10. 



CHAP. V.] CONSECRATION OF THE PRIESTS. 



160 



the consecration, and thereupon the priests were fully invested 
in their office. Accordingly, the Septuagint renders D^Q 
miUuhn by reXeiwaig, consummation ; and hence, perhaps, the 
apostle, speaking of Christ under the character of a priest, 
saith, he is tig tov aiwva TereXeuoiuicvog, Heb. vii. 28, consum- 
mated or perfected for ever. 

Godwin takes particular notice of two circumstances in 
these sacrifices : — 

1st. That some of the blood of the ram of consecration was 
put upon the tip of the right ear, and the thumb of the right 
hand, and the great toe of the right foot of the priests who 
were consecrated ; Exod. xxix. 20. Probably it was put upon 
their ear, as denoting the attention they, especially, ought to 
give to God's word, that they might be thoroughly instructed 
in the duties of their office, and be fit to be teachers of others ; 
for attention to the word of God, or care and diligence in 
learning his mind and will, is expressed by " opening the 
ear :" Job xxxvi. 10 ; Isa. 1. 5. 

The touching the right thumb with the same blood was to 
signify, that they were to attend with diligence on the work 
of their ministry, which is called " the work of their hands 
Deut. xxxiii. 11. This phrase is expressive of any sort of 
active service. It is said in the Acts, that " by the hands of 
the apostles w T ere many signs and wonders wrought among the 
people though some of these were wrought only by speak- 
ing, chap. v. 5 ; and others, by their shadow overshadowing the 
diseased; ver. 15, 16. 

Since the right hand only was consecrated by the sacrificial 
blood, the rabbies say, if a priest made use of his left, instead 
of his right, in performing any part of the service, it polluted 
it.* 

The touching of the great toe with the blood is supposed 
to signify, that they ought to take great heed, that their con- 
versation might be holy, without blame, and such as became 
the ministers of God ; for the conversation is frequently ex- 
pressed by walking : Psalm i. 1 ; xv. 2 ; Prov. x. 9 ; Isa. xxxiii. 
15 ; Phil. iii. 17 ; Gal. ii. 14 ; and in many other places, both 
of the Old and New Testament. And the application of the 

* Mishn. el Bartenor, et Maimon. in loc. ubi supra ; Maimon. de Ra~ 
tione adeundi Temple, ubi supra, sect, xviii. 



170 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



sacrificial blood to all these parts of the body, was doubtless 
intended to denote that all must be sanctified and rendered 
acceptable to God by the blood of Christ. 

The other circumstance which our author remarks, is, that 
" at the consecration of the priests, certain pieces of the sa- 
crifices were put into their hands," as was before observed. 
On which account their consecration itself is expressed by 
" filling their hands Exod. xxviii. 41, DVT>-nN ntttoi umil- 
leath eth-jadham, et implebis manum eorum. Our author 
from hence derives the custom in the Church of England, or, 
as he is pleased to express it, in the Christian church, of the 
bishop's giving a Bible into the hand of the minister to be or- 
dained ; " both which," he saith, " may signify, that no man 
taketh that honour to himself, but he that is called of God, 
as was Aaron :" and adds, " contrary to this did Jeroboam's 
priests ; whoever would, he filled his own hands," 1 Kings 
xiii. 33 : that is, " he thrust himself into the priesthood." I 
hope our author did not intend this comparison to Jeroboam's 
priests for a reflection on all ministers not episcopally ordained 
according to the rites of the English establishment. However, 
I beg leave to observe, that the words in Kings !T>-nN N^Dv f Dnn 
hechaphets jemalll eth jadho, should rather be rendered ejus 
qui voluit implevit manum, that is, Jeroboam filled the hand 
of him that would. Yet, because our king appoints to the 
episcopal office whom he pleases, far be it from me to com- 
pare our bishops to Jeroboam's priests. 

Godwin remarks some peculiarities, by which the high- 
priest was distinguished from the common priests. 

1st. He must marry none but a virgin ; Lev. xxi. 13, 14. 
Therefore he was exempt from the law of marrying his bro- 
ther's widow, in case he died without children ; Deut. xxv. 5. 
Our author says, another priest may lawfully marry a widow ; 
and Josephus says the same.* But there is no such express 
permission in the law ; only it is inferred from a widow's not 
being mentioned among those whom a common priest is 
forbid to marry; Lev. xxi. 7. Nevertheless, Grotius is of 
opinion the common priests had not this liberty, unless with 
respect to the widows of priests. This he grounds on the 
following passage of Ezekiel: "Neither shall they (that is, 
* Antiq. lib. iii. cap. xii. sect. ii. torn. i. p. 183, edit. Haverc. 



CHAP. V.] PECULIARITIES OF THE HIGH-PRIEST. 171 

any priests) take for their wives a widow, or her that is put 
away ; but they shall take maidens of the seed of the house of 
Israel, or a widow that had a priest before;" Ezek. xliv. 22.* 
However, it is certain the high-priest might marry none but a 
virgin ; and the rabbies have determined the age she must be, 
at the time of her marriage, within less than half a year, be- 
tween twelve years old and a day, and twelve years and a 
half. For they observe, she must not only be a virgin nVira 
bethulah, but he must marry her before she comes to the age 
of puberty, n^mm bibhthuleiha, in her virginity ; which, they 
say, was circumscribed within the short period I have men- 
tioned.f 

We may farther observe, they are much more liberal to the 
king than to the priest; allowing the former eighteen wives, 
the latter but one ; at least, if he did take another, they say, 
he must give a bill of divorce to one of them before the great 
day of expiation, otherwise he would be incapable of perform- 
ing the services then required.:}: 

2dly. The high-priest must not mourn for the death of his 
nearest kindred. He " shall not uncover his head, nor rend 
his clothes ; neither shall he go in to any dead body, nor de- 
file himself for his father, or for his mother. Neither shall he 
go out of the sanctuary, nor profane the sanctuary of his 
God;" Lev. xxi. 10 — 12. The ceremonies of mourning, here 
prohibited, are such as would not consist with his attending 
the service of the sanctuary; and the reason of the law is, 
that the public worship of God, in which the presence and 
ministration of the high-priest was in many cases necessary, 
might not be interrupted. 

The ceremonies forbidden are, 

1st. Uncovering his head. The Septuagint renders 
JHD* Vt^frO roshu lo jiphrang, ttjv KE^aXrjv ovk cnroKidapkxju, 
caput non nudabit cidari; or, if I may be allowed the expres- 
sion, he shall not unmitre his head ; a phrase which, though it 
is not an exact translation, does not improperly convey the true 

* See Grotii Annot. ad Lev. xxi. 14. 

t Vid. Selden, Uxor. Hebr. lib. ii. cap. vii. Oper. vol. ii. torn. ii. p. 555, 
.556. 

\ Selden, ubi supra, cap. viii. p. 561, 562, 



172 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



design of the law, which was to prevent his omitting the 
duties of his office on occasion of the death even of his nearest 
relations, which he must have done if he had complied with 
the custom of uncovering his head, or laying aside his mitre, 
that being one of the holy garments, without which it was un- 
lawful for him to officiate; Exod. xxviii. 36 — 38. The Chal- 
dee Paraphrase renders the word very differently from the 
Septuagint : in capite suo non nutriat comam. Ainsworth 
saith the Hebrew word JHS pharang, signifies, both to make 
bare and to make free: Onkelos, it seems, taking it in the 
latter sense, understands the meaning of the law to be, that 
their hair should not be left to grow free, without trimming. 
In this manner, we are told by Herodotus, the Egyptians 
used to express their mourning for the dead ;* letting the hair 
grow long, and in a negligent form, being considered as a 
mark of inattention to themselves, through excessive grief. 
Mephibosheth was in such deep concern for David on account 
of Absalom's rebellion, that " he neither trimmed his beard, 
nor washed his clothes, from the day the king departed from 
Jerusalem, until the day he came again in peace;" 2 Sam. 
xix. 24. If we understand the law according to the sense of 
Onkelos, it is either designed to prevent the high-priest's 
symbolizing w T ith the Heathens, in the rites of mourning, or 
to preserve decency in public worship, it not being fit that the 
chief minister in the sanctuary should appear with his hair 
long and neglected, as mourners sometimes did- 

However, both among the Jews and the neighbouring na- 
tions, it was a more usual sign of mourning, not only to 
uncover, but even to shave their heads. When Job was in- 
formed of his repeated losses, and of the death of his children, 
" he rent his mantle, and shaved his head;" Jobi. 20. And 
in the prophecy of Jeremiah we read of fourscore men, who 
were going to lament the desolation of Jerusalem, having 
their beards shaven, and their clothes rent ; Jer. xli. 5. That 
this was usual among the Persians appears from the following 
passage of Quintus Curtius: " Persae, comis suo more deton- 
sis, in lugubri veste, cum conjugibus ac liberis (Alexandrum), 

* Herodot. Euterp. cap. xxxvi. p. 101, edit. Gronov. Lugd. Bat. 1715, 



CHAP. V.] PECULIARITIES OF THE HIGH-PRIEST. 173 

non ut victorem, et modo hostem, sed ut gentis suae justissi- 
mum regem vero desiderio lugebant."* And that the same 
rite was in use among other nations, appears from Suetonius, 
in his life of Caligula, where, after observing, that on the 
death of Caesar Germanicus, some barbarous nations at war 
among themselves and with the Romans, agreed to a cessa- 
tion of hostilities, as if their grief had been of a domestic 
nature, and on an occasion which alike concerned them both, 
he adds, " Regulos quosdam (ferunt) barbam posuisse et ux- 
orum capita rasisse, ad indicium maximi luctus."f 

We meet with frequent references to this rite of mourning 
in Scripture. In the prophet Jeremiah : " Cut off thy hair, 
O Jerusalem ; take up a lamentation ;" chap. vii. 29. In the 
prophet Micah : " Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy 
delicate children, for they are gone into captivity;" chap. i. 16. 
In Isaiah : " The Lord shall shave with a razor that is hired, 
namely, by them beyond the river, by the king of Assyria, the 
head and the hair of the feet ; and it shall also consume the 
beard," referring to the Assyrian captivity; chap. vii. 20. And 
by the same prophet baldness is mentioned among the signs 
of mourning, chap. xxii. 12. And so by Jeremiah: "Every 
head shall be bald, and every beard dipt:" which is thus 
explained, "There shall be lamentation, generally, upon all 
the house-tops of Moab;" Jer. xlviii. 37, 38. And once more, 
lf Neither shall men lament for them, nor cut themselves, nor 
make themselves bald for them ;" chap. xvi. 6. Upon the 
whole, then, the prohibition of the high-priest's uncovering 
his head for the dead, probably means, not only that he must 
not appear without his mitre, but that he must not shave his 
head, nor yet, on the other hand, let his hair grow long and 
neglected. Both these extremes are expressly prohibited : 
" Neither shall they," that is, the priests, " shave their heads, 
nor suffer their locks to grow long ;" Ezek. xliv. 20. 

2dly. The high-priest must not rend his clothes, in token 
of mourning for the dead, which was anciently much practised 
by the Jews and other nations. Quintus Curtius saith, that 

* Quint. Curt, de Gestis Alexand. lib. x. cap. v. sect. xvii. p. 785, edit, 
Lugd. Bat. 1696. 

f In Vita Calig. cap. w sect. iii. iv. torn. i. p. 768, edit. Pitisci, Tra- 
ject. ad Rhen. 1690. 



174 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



when Darius was on the point of being seized by Bessus and 
the Bactrians, in order to be delivered up to Alexander, and 
the only domestic left about him made such loud lamentations 
as alarmed the camp, " irrupere deinde alii laceratisque ves- 
tibus, lugubri et barbaro ululatu regem deplorare cceperunt."* 
Virgil says of Amata, that apprehending Turnus was dead, 

Se causam clamat, crimenque caputque malorura, 
Multaque per mcestum demens effata furorem, 
Purpureos moritura manu discindit amictus, 
Et nodum informis lethi trabe nectit ab alta. 

Mneid, xii. 1. 600 — 603. 

And Latinus, her husband, hearing of her unhappy fate, 

It scissa veste Latinus 

Conjugis attonitus fatis urbisque mina. 

Ib. 1. 609, 610. 

So Juvenal, describing the funeral rites with which Priam 
would have been honoured, had he died before Paris com- 
mitted the rape of Helen, saith, 

Incolumi Troja Priamus venisset ad umbras 
Assaraci magnis solemnibus, Hectare funus 
Portante, ac reliquis fratrum cervicibus, inter 
Iliadum lacrymas, ut primos edere planctus 
Cassandra inciperet, scissaque Polyxena palla. 

Satyr, x. I. 258 — 262. 

We have this rite of mourning frequently mentioned in 
Scripture, as practised on various occasions, particularly on 
the death of relations or friends, as by Reuben and his father 
Jacob on the supposed death of Joseph, Gen. xxxvii. 29 — 
34; and by David, on the death of Saul and Jonathan, 
2 Sam. i. 11: sometimes it was practised on account of great, 
injuries received, as by Tamar, when she had been abused by 
her brother Amnon, 2 Sam. xiii. 19; or on account of the in- 
fliction or denunciation of public judgments; for which reason 
it is mentioned as a sign of great stupidity in king Jehoiakim 
and his courtiers, that when they read, in a roll of Jeremiah's 
prophecy, what judgments God threatened to bring upon the 
nations, "they were not afraid, nor rent their garments;" 
Jer. xxxvi. 24. Again, it was practised when they heard 

* Quint. Curt, de Gestis Alexand. Magn. lib. v. cap. x. sect. xii. p. 358, 
edit- Lugd. Bat. 1696. 



( HAP. V.] PECULIARITIES OF THE HIGH-PRIEST. 176 

blasphemy or any other profane contempt of God, as by 
king Hezekiah and his officers, when they heard the blas- 
phemous railing of Rabshakeh; Isa. xxxvi. 22, and chap, 
xxxvii. 1. The rabbies indeed say, it was to be practised only 
on hearing blasphemy from one of their own nation, and there- 
fore they conclude Rabshakeh was an apostate Jew. # In this 
way they expressed their detestation of either words or actions 
that were affrontive to the Deity. When, therefore, the priest 
and people at Lystra would have paid divine honours to Paul 
and Barnabas, " they rent their clothes Acts xiv. 14. And 
this Caiaphas did, when our Saviour declared himself to be the 
Son of God, on which account he charged him with blas- 
phemy ; Matt. xxvi. 65. Upon this a question has been 
started, whether he did not herein act contrary to the law in 
Leviticus, which, in two places, under a severe penalty, for- 
bids the high-priest rending his clothes; Lev. x. 6, and 
chap. xxi. 10. Grotius observes, the occasion in both cases 
was the death of relations, and that there is no express pro- 
hibition which extends to any other occasion .-j- Besides, 
these were both very peculiar and extraordinary cases. The 
one was, the death of Nadab and Abihu by the immediate 
hand of God, for offering strange fire on the altar, when 
neither their father nor their brethren were permitted to show 
any sign of mourning, lest it should look like arraigning the 
Divine justice ; and perhaps it might be intended as an ad- 
ditional punishment to them, that they should not only be 
struck dead, but die unlamented The latter prohibition, 
chap. xxi. 10, is in the case of the priest's daughter playing 
the harlot, for which she was to be burnt with fire, ver. 9 ; 
and then it follows, he, that is, the high-priest, shall not un- 
cover his head, nor rend his clothes, because, on such an oc- 
casion, it would look like a reflection on the legislator, or on 
the law itself. However, if the prohibition be supposed to 
extend to all cases, it probably related to the sacerdotal vest- 
ments only, which were not to be rent on any occasion .J 

* In libro Praeceptorum. See the passage quoted by Drusius on Matt, 
xxvi. 65. 

f Agreeably to the Chaldee Paraphrast in loc. 

\ Selden. de Jure Natur. et Gent. lib. ii. cap. xii. Oper. vol. i. torn. i. 
p. 271, 272. 



176 



JEWISH ANT1QL II IES. 



[BOOK [. 



And so it is certain the Jews in later ages understood it ; for 
it is said in the First Book of Maccabees, chap. xi. 71, that 
Jonathan the high-priest, on the defeat and flight of his army, 
" rent his clothes." And in Josephus we are informed, that 
to appease a popular commotion, excited by the cruelties of 
Florus, procurator of Judea, the principal persons, and par- 
ticularly the high-priests, rent their garments, nag w^jrar 
ntpiepp rfea vto, and on their knees besought the people not to 
push things to extremity, lest the consequence should be their 
ruin. And when the tumult, which was thus allayed, was 
like to be revived, they had recourse to the same expedient : 
rovg Se ap)(i£pziQ avrovg r\v tSav KaTa^w/dEvovg /uev rr)g Ki<pa\i}c 
koviv, yv/uLvovg Se ra artpva twv gStitujv ntpuppy&fAtvwv-* The 
rabbies say, the high-priest was allowed to rend his clothes at 
the bottom, but not from the top to the bottom ,f which was 
the common way. They tell us, moreover, that it must be 
done standing, which they ground on the example of David, 
who, it is said, on a report that Absalom had slain all his 
brethren, arose and tore his garments; 2 Sam. xiii. 31. They 
add, that the rent must not be more than a hand's breadth, 
and that it must be made in the upper garment, and in the 
fore-part of it. J 

The third peculiarity of the high-priest consisted in his pre- 
siding over the inferior priests, in taking v care that all things 
were conducted with decency, and according to the law, and 
in performing himself some appropriate parts of the divine 
service. 

Godwin saith, that both the high-priest and the inferior 
priests burnt incense, and offered sacrifices, 1 Chron. vi. 49, 
and even slew the victims, 2 Chron. xxix. 22 ; that they both 
sounded the trumpet, either for an alarm in war, or to as- 
semble the people and their rulers, Numb. x. 1 — 8 ; that they 
both instructed the people, Lev. x. 11; Deut. xvii. 8 — 12; 
Mai. ii. 7 ; and both judged and determined concerning leprosy, 
Lev. xiii. 2 ; and he might have added, concerning cases of 
adultery by the waters of jealousy, Numb. v. 19; and con- 
cerning things vowed, or devoted, the former being redeem- 

* De Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. xv. sect. ii. iv. edit. Haverc. 

f Mishn. tit. Horajoth. cap. iii. sect. v. torn. iv. p. 501, edit. Surenhus. 

X Yid. Maimon. de Luctu. cap. viii. sect. i. ii. 



(HAP. V .J 



THE S A 6 AN. 



177 



able at a valuation or price set by the priest, the latter not : 
Lev. xxvii. 8. 28. 

It belonged likewise to the priests to set on and remove the 
shew-bread ; to tend and supply the lamps, Lev. xxiv. 1 — 9 ; 
to burn the red heifer, Numb. xix. 2 ; to bless the people, 
Numb. vi. 23 — 27 ; and to keep watch in three several 
places of the temple ; 2 Chron. xxiii. 4. No doubt the high- 
priest had power or authority, in virtue of his office, to perform 
any part of the sacerdotal service, and several of the articles 
already mentioned are expressly declared to pertain to him as 
well as to the inferior priests ; however, some of the more la- 
borious parts of the service were ordinarily performed by the 
inferior priests under his direction. 

On the other hand, he had his peculiar province, the prin- 
cipal branches of which were, inquiring of the Lord, and 
giving answers by Urim and Thummim, and performing the 
most holy parts of the divine service, especially on the great 
annual fast, or day of expiation, when, clothed in his linen 
garments, he went alone into the holy of holies, and there 
burnt incense, and sprinkled some of the blood of the sacrifice 
upon the mercy-seat ; Lev. xvi. throughout, and Heb. ix. 7. 

The duties of his office on that day will be considered in 
their place, when we are treating of the Jewish festivals. 

It is, however, proper here to take notice of what our 
author observes concerning the high-priest's suffragan, or 
deputy, called OT sagan, as some write it, or, as others, 
TO segen, who, in case of the high-priest's incapacity by sick- 
ness or any legal uncleanness, discharged his office for him. 
The word pD sagan, in the singular number, is never used in 
Scripture ; but the plural DV3AD seganim several times occurs, 
and seems always to import secular rulers, or governors ; as 
particularly in the book of Nehemiah, where the D^JD sega- 
nim are joined with the nobles, and are not improperly called 
rulers in the English version, Nehem. iv. 14 — 19. In Isaiah, 
chap. xli. 25, we style them princes; and Daniel is said to be 
made chief of the seganim, which we there render governors ; 
Dan. ii. 48. And certain it is, his was not an ecclesiastical, 
but civil office. So that in all those places, and wherever 
else the word occurs in the Hebrew Bible, it evidently im- 
ports secular dignity and authority. Nevertheless, the singular 

N 



178 JEWISH ANTIQL ITIE*. [BOOK I 

noun sagan its often used by the Hebrew doctor* tor an ec- 
clesiastical person. The Targum of Jonathan, on the Second 
Book of Kings, renders " the priest of the second order" the 
sagan of the priests, on 2 Kings xxiii. 4 ; and calls " Zephaniah, 
the second priest," the sagan, on 2 Kings xxv. 18. And in 
the prophecy of Jeremiah it in one place styles him (Jer. lii. 
24), and in another, Pashur (Jer. xx. 1), the sagan of the 
priests. It is agreed on all hands, that the sagan was next to 
the high-priest, and his vicegerent ; but for what end he was 
appointed, and what were the duties of his office, is disputed. 
One opinion, espoused by Cunaeus,* is, that he was onlv to 
officiate for the high-priest, in case he was rendered incapable 
of attending the service through sickness, or legal uncleanness, 
on the day of expiation. Josephus gives an instance of the 
service of that day being performed by one Joseph, the son of 
Eli, as deputy, or sagan, of the high-priest Matthias, who the 
night before had been accidentally rendered unclean ;f and 
Mr. Selden J informs us, out of the Jerusalem and Babylonish 
Talmud, that Simeon, the high-priest, being rendered unclean 
by some drops of spittle falling on his garments the day before, 
his brother Judah officiated as his sagan on the day of ex- 
piation. The patrons of this opinion tell us the sagan was ap- 
pointed the preceding evening, and for the service of that day 
only. So that, according to them, there w T as a new sagan 
every year, or, at least, he was appointed anew to his office. 
The mishnical book Joma § tells us farther, that they not only 
appointed a sagan for the high-priest, in case he should be 
polluted, but likewise a wife, in case his wife should die on 
that day, or the night before. For it is said, " He shall 
make atonement for himself, and for his house Lev. xvi. 6. 
Now a house, it is said, implies a w T ife, which, therefore, he 
must not be without on that day. 

After all, the sagan's officiating for the high-priest on the 
day of expiation has no foundation in Scripture, by which no 
man is allowed to officiate in the holy of holies but the high- 

* De Repub. Hebr. lib. ii. cap, vi. 

f Antiq. lib. xvii. cap. vi. sect. iv. edit. Haverc. 

X De Success, in Pontificat. lib, i. cap. xii. apud Opera, vol. i. torn, i 
p. 145, 146, Londini, 1726. 

§ Cap. i. sect. i. torn. ii. p. 206, edit. Surenhus, 



CHAP. \ .] 



T H E S A G A N . 



in 



priest ; and if, therefore, he was sick, or otherwise disabled, 
that part of the service must, no doubt, be omitted ; which, 
in case of necessity, it might be, without such bad consequence 
as the rabbies apprehend, who make the efficacy of all the 
sacrifices of the ensuing year to depend upon it. 

Others think the sagan was the high-priest's vicar, or suf- 
fragan, to assist him in the care of (and in his absence to 
oversee) the affairs of the temple and the service of the 
priests. Dr. Lightfoot, in support of this opinion, observes, 5 * 
that the sagan is commonly called, both in the Targum t and 
by the rabbies, D>3NDn pD sagan haccoanim, the sagan of the 
priests, which seems to import, that his office referred as much 
(if not more) to the common priests, as to the high-priest. 
Maimonides in particular says, J; all the priests were at 
the command of the sagan." According to this opinion, his 
office was not for a day only, but probably for life, at least 
till he became superannuated, or till the high-priest's death. 
Some say he was always heir apparent to the high-priesthood, 
and that none could be high-priest, who had not first been 
sagan. § To this Dr. Lightfoot objects, not only that it could 
not be the case under the second temple, and after the days 
of Herod, when the pontifical dignity was at the arbitrary dis- 
posal of the Roman presidents, who preferred to it whom they 
pleased ; but even in earlier ages, when the succession was 
legal and regular, we do not find that he whom the Targum 
calls sagan, always succeeded on a demise. There is not the 
least intimation that Zephaniah, who in the Second Book of 
Kings is called the second priest, or sagan, was the son of 
Seraiah the high-priest, or succeeded him in his office ; 2 Kings 
xxv. 18. 

Upon the whole, it is probable, that he who was next in 
the succession to the high-priesthood, was for the most part 
appointed sagan, but not always, since it required a person 
of learning and experience in the laws and ritual to assist the 

* Temple Service, chap. v. sect, i.; and Horse Hebraicae on Luke iii. 2. 
t See Targum Jonathan on 2 Kings xxv. 18, and Jer. Iii. 24. 
X Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. iv. sect. xvi. apud Crenii Fascicul. 
Sext. p. 115. 

§ R. Solom. in Numb. xix. and Talmud Hierosolym. quoted in Lightfoot's 
Temple Service, chap. iv. 

N 2 



180 



.1 E \V I S H A N T [QUI T 1 E S . 



[book I . 



high-priest, especially if he were a weak man ; and therefore 
it is likely they regarded merit rather than birth in the choice 
and appointment of this officer. 

The divine institution of him is conceived to be in the fol- 
lowing passage of the book of lumbers: " Eleazar, the son 
of Aaron the priest, shall be chief over the chief of the Le- 
vites, and have the oversight of them that keep the charge of 
the sanctuary ;" Numb. iii. 32. Thus, it appears, there were 
some among the priests and Levites, who had pre-eminence 
and authority over their brethren ; each, perhaps, being an 
overseer to a certain number, or presiding in a particular 
branch of the service of the sanctuary; but Eleazar was chief 
over these chiefs. Hence, says Ainsworth,* arises the dis- 
tinction of the high-priest and the second priest. And when 
Aaron was dead, and Eleazar, the second priest, w r as high- 
priest in his room, Numb. xx. 26. 28, then Phinehas, Eleazar's 
son, succeeded him in the office of second priest, or governor 
over the Levites ; for Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, is said in 
the First Book of Chronicles to have been ruler over them, that 
is, the Levites, in time past; 1 Chron. ix. 20. 

From hence it should seem, the hint was first taken of ap- 
pointing, besides bishops, who have the oversight of the priests 
in particular dioceses, archbishops, who have the oversight of 
the bishops of several dioceses, or are " chief of the chiefs." 
But the New Testament is totally silent concerning such an 
institution for the government of the Christian church. 

The rabbies speak of three other sorts of sacerdotal officers, 
superior to common priests, but inferior to the high-priest 
and sagan ; i^p^inp katholik'ui, i^DlDN imnmrcalin, and fVQU 
gizbarin. 

There were two kathoUhin, of whom Maimonidesf gives 
this short account, that they were to the sagan as the sagan 
to the high-priest, namely, substitutes and assistants, and next 
in place and honour. According to other Hebrew writers, 
their office related to the treasuries of the temple, and to the 
management of the revenues arising from the oblations. 

The immarcalin were seven, who carried the keys of the 
seven gates of the court, and one could not open them without 



* In loc. 



f De Apparatu Templi, cap. iv. sect. xvii. 



C II A P . V . J 



SACERDOTAL OFFICERS. 



181 



the rest.* According to which account, each gate must have 
seven different locks, the keys of which were severally kept 
by the seven immarcalin* Some of the rabbies tell us, there 
were seven rooms at the seven gates ; in which the sacred 
vessels and vestments were kept, under the care of these 
officers, f 

The gizbarin were not to be less than three, who were a 
sort of treasurers, or collectors of the offerings brought to the 
tern pie, J which they accounted for to the immarcal 'in, and 
they to the katholikin, and all under the inspection of the 
high-priest and sagan. But having no mention of these 
officers in the sacred Scriptures, we shall enter into no farther 
particulars concerning them.^ 

We proceed to speak of the inferior priests. These were 
grown so numerous in David's time, that it became very in- 
convenient for them to attend the service at the tabernacle all 
together. He therefore divided them into twenty-four com- 
panies, w 7 ho were to serve in rotation, each company by itself, 
for a week; 1 Chron. xxiv. throughout. That he did this by 
divine appointment, appears from the following passage : 
" David gave to Solomon his son the pattern of all that he 
had by the Spirit, of the courts of the house of the Lord ; 
also for the courses, mpVnD machlekoth , of the priests and the 
Levites;" 1 Chron. xxviii. 11 — 13. These courses are here 
called rvp/ITO machlekoth, from p?n chalak, divisit : and in 
Nehemiah, rtHDtt'O mishmaroth, from IftW shamar, custodivit, 
Nehem. xiii. 30. The Septuagint renders both these words 
by tfoifiEptai, in which they are followed by St. Luke, who 
saith that Zacharias the priest, the father of John the Baptist, 
was e£ £(f)t]u.epiag Apia, of the course of Abia; Luke i. 5. The 
word 8(j>iiu£pia is derived from the form of the Athenian re- 
public. The country of Attica was divided into ten (pv\ag,or 
tribes ; fifty persons were chosen out of each tribe, who com- 
posed the senate ; and each fifty sat and governed for one 
day in their turns. Hence their Apxn, or form of govern 
ment, was called ecpYifizpoc ; because their governors were daily 

* Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, ubi supra. 

f Joseph, ad Shekalim, cap. v. R. Solom. in 2 Kings xii. 

X Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. iv. sect, xviii. ubi supra. 

§ See Lightfoot's Temple Service, ubi supra. 



182 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [iiOOK [. 

changed according to a regular rotation.* Now there being 
a considerable resemblance between this division and succes- 
sion of the Attic senators and that of the Jewish priests, 
the Septuagint applies the word e^rj/uLspia to the courses of the 
priests ; though somewhat improperly, because they shifted 
not daily but weekly, as is concluded from its being said in 
Chronicles, that the porters of the gate were relieved by their 
brethren every seven days, 1 Chron. ix. 25; and if the in- 
ferior officers relieved one another weekly, it is reasonable to 
suppose the priests did so too. There is the more reason for 
this conclusion, because the courses of the priests and of the 
porters are mentioned together in the account of Solomon's 
confirming the regulation which his father David had made : 
*' He appointed, according to the order of David his father, 
the courses of the priests to their service, and the Levites to 
their charge, the porters also by their courses at every gate;" 
2 Chron. viii. 14. The time of shifting the courses seems to 
have been the sabbath ; for the priests are described by this 
periphrasis, "Those that enter in on the sabbath;" 2 Kings 
xi. 5. So that each course attended the service of the sanc- 
tuary, for a week, twice a-year. 

The Jewish writers say, the first circulation of the courses 
began on the first sabbath of the month Nisan, answering to 
our March and April ; and the second on the first sabbath of 
the month Tizri, answering to our September and October ; 
and so they make two circulations to complete the year. But 
whereas there were but twenty-four courses, which therefore 
in this double circulation would fill up only forty-eight weeks, 
or eleven months, they say the weeks of the three great feasts 
were not taken into this account ; for then all the courses at- 
tended, being all obliged by the law to appear before the Lord ; 
Exod. xxiii. 17. If so, the double circulation of the twenty- 
four courses would very near complete the Jewish year. 

Each course had its respective head, or chief. These are 
called, " chief men of the houses of their fathers ;'' of whom 
there were sixteen, and consequently sixteen courses, of the 
posterity of Eleazar, and eight of the posterity of Ithamar; 
1 Chron. xxiv. 4. These chiefs of their respective divisions 

* Vid. Joseph. Scaliger. de Emendatione Tempor. lib. i. p. 25, and 
62, 63. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE 



COURSES OF THE PRIESTS. 



183 



were called D'Oron sare haccohanim, princes, or chiefs 
of' the priests : Ezra viii. 24 : chap. x. 5. These were pro- 
bably the aoyitpuQ, or chief priests, so often mentioned in the 
New Testament : Matt. xvi. 21 ; xxvii. 12. 41 ; John vii. 32 ; 
xviii. 3 ; Acts ix. 14, &c. These chief priests are, in several 
places, mentioned together with the elders, scribes, and pha- 
risees of chief note, as being fellow-members of the Sanhe- 
drim, the supreme court of judicature. 

The order in which the several courses were to serve was 
determined by lot, 1 Chro.ii. xxiv. 5 ; and each course was, 
in all succeeding ages, called by the name of its chief at the 
time of its first division. Thus Zacharias is said to be of the 
course of Abia, the eighth course; of which Abijah, or Abia, 
was the chief in David's time ; ver. 10. And Joseph us says,* 
he himself was of the first course, or the course of Jehoiarib, 
upon whom the first lot fell ; ver. 7. 

As the great number of the sacerdotal order occasioned 
their being first divided into twenty-four companies, so in after 
times the number of each company grew too large for them 
all to minister together ; for there were no less, according to 
Josephus, than five thousand priests in one course, in his 
time.f The Jewish writers, therefore, tell us, that the mi- 
nistry of each course was divided according to the number of 
the houses of their fathers that were contained in it.J For 
instance, if a course consisted of five such houses, three served 
three days, and the other two, two days a-piece. If it con- 
tained six, five served five days, and the other, two days. If 
it contained seven, the priests of each house served a day.§ 
And they farther inform us, that the particular branches of 
the service were assigned by lot to each priest, whose turn it 
was to attend on the ministry ; as who should kill the sacri- 
fices, who sprinkle the blood, who burn the incense, &c.|| 
Thus St. Luke tells us, that V according to the custom of the 
priest's office, it was the lot of Zacharias to burn incense, 

* Joseph. Vita, ab initio. 

f Joseph, contra Appion. cap. ii. vol. ii. p. 477, edit. Havercamp. 
% Mairaon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. iv. sect. xi. p. 113, Crenii Fascicul. 
Sext. 

§ Talmud. Hieros. in Taanith, cap. iv. et Thosaph. ad loc. See the pas- 
sage quoted by Lightfoot, Temple Service, chap. vi. sub fine. 

j| Mishn, Tamidh. cap. iii. sect. i. torn, v, p. 201 , edit. Surenhus. 



184 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1. 



when he went into the temple of the Lord ;" Luke i. 9. The 
rabbies say, but four of the courses returned from the cap- 
tivity, those mentioned in Ezra, namely, " the children of 
Jedaiah of the house of Joshua, the children of Immer, the 
children of Pashur, and the children of Harim ;" Ezra ii. 36 — 
39. And they tell us in what manner the priests were di- 
vided by lot into twenty-four courses, which were still called 
by the ancient names. # But it may be objected to this ac- 
count, that Pashur was not the ancient head or name of any 
of the twenty-four courses ; and that in the catalogue of the 
priests who returned from the captivity, which we have in the 
twelfth chapter of Nehemiah, there are the names of several 
others of the chiefs or heads of the courses, besides the three 
mentioned by Ezra ; as Shechaniah, who was the head of the 
tenth course ; Abijah, the head of the eighth ; Bilgah, the 
head of the fifteenth ; and Jojarib, who was the head of the 
first course. It is probable, that the chief of each course was 
always called by the name of him who was its chief at its first 
division in the days of David. 

Not only were the priests divided into twenty-four courses, 
but the Levites, and indeed the whole people of Israel, as 
will be seen when we come to speak of the viri stationarii, 
whom our author mentions toward the close of this chapter. 

The Levites being, in the larger sense of the word, the 
posterity of the patriarch Levi, the third son of Jacob by 
Leah, were one of the twelve tribes of Israel ; but in a more 
restrained and peculiar sense, they were a lower order of 
ecclesiastical persons, inferior to the priests, and their assist- 
ants in the sacred service. In this subordinate capacity were 
all the males of the tribe of Levi, beside the family of Aaron, 
who were the priests ; and it is very observable, that the 
posterity of Moses were no more than common Levites, while 
the descendants of his brother Aaron were advanced, by the 
appointment of his law, to the dignity of the priesthood ; 
1 Chron. xxiii. 13, 14. A plain evidence that Moses was in- 
fluenced by no worldly or ambitious views ; or rather, that he 
was not the contriver and author of the law which he gave to 
Israel, but received it frorn God : for had he framed it, it is 
natural to suppose, he would have made some better provision 
* Talmud. Hieros. etThosaph. ad Taanith, ubi supra. 



CHAP. V.] 



OF THE LEV1TES. 



185 



than he did, for his sons, and for the grandeur of his house, 
and not have advanced his brother's above his own. 

Indeed, the Levites were appointed to the service of the 
sanctuary by God himself, for the following reason : — 

When he miraculously destroyed all the first-born of the 
Egyptians, Exod. xii. 29, he spared the first-born of the Is- 
raelites, and, in order to preserve the memory of the miracle, 
and of that great deliverance from their bondage in Egypt 
which it occasioned, he was pleased to appoint, that for the 
future all the first-born males " should be set apart unto him- 
self:" Exod. xiii. 12 — 16; Numb. viii. 17. But afterward, 
upon the sons of Levi discovering an extraordinary zeal against 
idolatry in the case of the golden calf, Exod. xxxii. 26 — 28, 
he was pleased to assign the honour of attending his imme- 
diate service to that whole tribe, instead of the first-born of 
Israel; Numb. iii. 12, 13; chap. viii. 18. And that it might 
appear there was a just substitution of the Levites for the 
first-born, number for number, he ordered an estimate to be 
made of both ; and when, on casting up the poll, the first-born 
were found to exceed the Levites by two hundred seventy- 
three, the surplus was redeemed at the price of five shekels 
a-head, which was paid to the priests for the use of the sanc- 
tuary ; Numb. iii. 14, to the end. 

The Levites, originally, were distinguished into three classes, 
or families, from the three sons of Levi, Kohath, Gershon, and 
Merari, called Kohathites, Gershonites, and Merarites ; though 
afterward by David, as we have already observed, they, as 
well as the priests, were divided into twenty-four courses : 
1 Chron. xxiii. 6; chap, xxviii. 11. 13. A great part of the 
service assigned them, on their first institution in the wil- 
derness, was peculiar to the state of the Israelites at that 
time, namely, taking down the tabernacle, setting it up, and 
carrying it about, as they removed from place to place.* To 
the Kohathites was committed the charge of the most sacred 
things, the ark of the testimony, and all the instruments of 
the sanctuary. The Gershonites were to take down, carry, 
and put up, the curtains of the tabernacle, and its covering 
of badger skins, and the veil, or curtains, which served for a 

* See the respective service of the classes in the fourth chapter of 
Numbers, 



186 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1 . 



door; as also the curtain which formed the court round it. 
The Merarites had the care of the boards of the tabernacle, 
with the bars, pillars, and sockets, both of the tabernacle and 
of the court. 

When the Israelites were settled in the land of Canaan, 
and the tabernacle was no longer carried about as before, the 
service of the Levites was of course changed, and became 
much easier. On which account, in David's time, they were 
thought fit to enter on their office at twenty years old, 1 Chron. 
xxiii. 24. 27, 28; whereas they were not admitted, by the ori- 
ginal appointment of Moses, till they were twenty-five or 
thirty, and were discharged at fifty, Ivumb. iv. 3. 23. 43, and 
chap. viii. 24, 25; probably because their service was then 
very laborious, and required great bodily strength. I say, 
they were not to enter on their office till they were twenty-five 
or thirty years old; — the account in the fourth chapter of 
Numbers saith, they are to " do the work of the tabernacle 
of the congregation from thirty years old and upward;" and 
in the eighth chapter it is said, that " from twenty-five year* 
old and upward they should go in to wait on the service of 
the tabernacle of the congregation." In order to reconcile 
these two accounts, some suppose, that from twenty-five to 
thirty years of age they attended only to learn the duties of 
their office, but did not actually perform any part of the ser- 
vice till they were fully thirty. This is the opinion of Mai- 
monides. # But other rabbiesf tell us, they entered on the 
easier and lighter parts of the service, such as keeping watch 
at the sanctuary, and bearing a part in the choir, at twenty- 
five; but did not meddle with the more laborious till thirty. 
The Jews indeed inform us, that the Levites passed through 
four different degrees. From one month old to their twentieth 
year they were instructed in the law of God : from twenty to 
twenty-five, in the functions of their ministry; from thence to 
thirty they served a sort of apprenticeship, beginning to exer- 
cise themselves in some of the lower branches of the sacred 
service ; and lastly, when they attained their thirtieth year, 
they were fully instituted in their office. Some have observed 

* De Apparatu Templi, cap. iii. sect, vii.; and also the Babylonish Ge- 
mara, Cholin, cap. i. 

f Aben-Ezra on Numb, viii. 



CHAP. V.] 



OF THE LEVITES. 



187 



much the same degrees among the vestal virgins, which per- 
haps were borrowed from the Jewish Levites. Thirty years 
they were bound to the strictest chastity ; the first ten of which 
were spent in learning the mysteries of their profession; the 
second ten they ministered in holy things ; and the last ten 
were employed in bringing up young novices.* Some have 
thought, and in particular our author, that the apostle alludes 
to these degrees of the Levites when he tells Timothy, that 
they who perform the office of a deacon well, purchase to 
themselves a good degree, kciXov flaO/mov; 1 Tim. iii. 13. 

Moses ordered, that at the age of fifty the Levites should 
" cease waiting upon the service of the tabernacle, and should 
serve no more Numb. viii. 25. Yet he immediately adds, 
" They shall minister with their brethren in the tabernacle of 
the congregation, to keep the charge, and shall do no service." 
It seems, therefore, they were not dismissed ; but, while they 
were exempted from all laborious employment, continued to 
execute the easier part of their ministry ; and, probably, in- 
structed the younger Levites in the duties of their office. 

We have seen before, that the Levites were originally 
divided into three- families. In David's time they were distin- 
guished into three classes, to each of which a different service 
was assigned ; and probably each was divided into twenty-four 
courses. The first class were " to wait upon the sons of 
Aaron, for the service of the house of the Lord;" that is, to 
assist the priests in the exercise of their ministry, " to purify 
the holy things, to prepare the shew-bread, and flour, and 
wine, and oil for the sacrifice : and sometimes to kill the sacri- 
fice," when there was more work of the sort than the priest 
could conveniently perform: 1 Chron. xxiii.28, 29; 2 Chron. 
xxix. 34 ; and chap. xxxv. 10 — 14. So that it was not neces- 
sary that the sacrifice should be slain by the priest, as some 
erroneously suppose, alleging against the consideration of 
Christ's death as a proper sacrifice, that he must, in that case, 
in the character of a priest, have slain himself. 

The second class of Levites formed the temple choir: the 
division of this class into twenty-four courses is expressly re- 
corded in the twenty-fifth chapter of the First Book of Chro- 
nicles. Some imagine there were women singers, as well as 
* Dionvs. Halicarn, lib. li. 



188 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1. 



men, in the temple choir ; because in the book of Ezra, among 
those who returned from the Babylonish captivity, there are 
said to have been two hundred, Ezra ii. 65, and elsewhere we 
read of two hundred forty-five, Nehem. vii. 67, singing men and 
women. The Jewish doctors will, indeed, by no means admit 
there were any female voices in the temple choir ; and as for 
those nnnt^D meshoreroth, as they are called in the Hebrew, 
they suppose them to be the wives of those who sung.* Ne- 
vertheless the following passage makes it evident, that women, 
likewise, were thus employed : " God gave to Heman four- 
teen sons and three daughters ; and all these were under the 
hands of their father for song in the house of the Lord, with 
cymbals, psalteries, and harps, for the service of the house of 
God;" 1 Chron. xxv. 5, 6. 

Instrumental music was first introduced into the Jewish 
service by Moses, and afterward, by the express command of 
God, was very much improved with the addition of several 
instruments in the reign of David. When Hezekiah restored 
the temple service, which had been neglected in his prede- 
cessor's reign, it is said, that " he set the Levites in the house 
of the Lord, with cymbals, with psalteries, and with harps, 
according to the commandment of David, and of Gad the 
king's seer, and Nathan the prophet; for so was the com- 
mandment of the Lord by his prophets;" 2 Chron. xxix. 25. 
The instruments originally appointed in the law of Moses 
were only two ; namely, the m2Mfn chatsotseroth, or silver 
trumpets, Numb. x. 2, which they were to blow in their 
solemn days, and over their burnt-offerings, and over the sacri- 
fices of their peace-offerings," ver. 10; and the "iDVitf shophar, 
or cornet, as the word is rendered in the following passage of 
the Psalmist : " With trumpets and sound of cornet make a 
joyful noise before the Lord, the King;" Psalm xcviii. 6. Here 
it is expressly distinguished from the trumpet, though in many 
other places, in our version, it is confounded with it. As we 
are informed, that the nnDtt^ shopheroth, used at the siege of 
Jericho, were of " rams' horns," Josh. vi. 4, it is probable this 
instrument was made of horn, and is therefore properly rendered 
a cornet. It was appointed by the law to be blown throughout 

* Reland. Antiq. part ii. cap. vi. sect. vi. p. 235, third edit. 1717. \ 



CHAP. V.] 



THE TEMPLE MUSIC. 



189 



the land, when they proclaimed the year of jubilee, on the day 
of atonement ; Lev. xxv. 9. It may be observed, that as no 
other instruments are prescribed by the ritual, besides the 
trumpet and the cornet, it is likely they were the only ones at 
that time in use among the Jews, and which they had skill to 
play on, except we reckon the *yin toph, or timbrel, which was 
used by the women ; Exod. xv. 20. But as that was properly 
a sort of tabor, without any variety of notes, used only to 
accompany the voice, it hardly deserves to be ranked among 
the musical instruments. It is not indeed likely the Israel- 
ites, who were a poor labouring people, but lately come from 
working at the brick-kilns, should have much skill in music at 
the time of their receiving the law ; only some could make 
shift to sound the horn, or the trumpet, which therefore was 
all the music that could then be prescribed to attend the sacri- 
fices. But when they were grown more polite and skilful, in 
the reign of David, several other instruments were added by 
divine direction. When some, therefore, plead for instru- 
mental music in Christian worship, as pleasing to God, though 
not commanded, from the notion of its having been first intro- 
duced into the Jewish w r orship by David, without any divine 
institution, notwithstanding which God approved of it, they 
commit two mistakes. For David did not introduce any part 
of the temple music without an express divine injunction : " So 
was the commandment of the Lord by his prophets." And it 
was not first brought in by him, but by Moses, who prescribed 
it to attend the sacrifices, so far as it could be practised in 
those times. And when, in after-ages, they were more skil- 
ful in music, and capable of performing the service in a better 
manner, they were required so to do ; nevertheless, not one 
new instrument was then added without divine direction and 
appointment. But to return to the temple choir. 

The music there used was both vocal and instrumental : " As 
well singers as players on instruments shall be there;" Psalm 
lxxxvii. 7. In David's time there were appointed three mas- 
ters of the band of music, Heman, Asaph, and Ethan, 
1 Chron. xv. 17; whose names are prefixed to some of the 
psalms, perhaps because they set them to music. Asaph's 
name is inscribed to the fiftieth, seventy- third, and ten follow- 
ing psalms ; Heman's to the eighty-eighth ; and Ethan's to the 



L90 



J i:\visu A \ i igi iTIES. 



[book I. 



eighty-ninth. There was also, over all the rest, one chief 
musician, or head master of the choir, to whom several of the 
psalms are inscribed, or to whose care it was entrusted to have 
them set to music, and performed in the tabernacle or temple. 
At the time of writing the thirty-ninth, sixty-second, and 
seventy-seventh psalms, this master's name was Jeduthun. 

The vocal music was performed by the Levites. The He- 
brew doctors say, the number of voices must not be less than 
twelve, but might be more without limitation.* They add, 
that the youth, the sons of the Levites, bore a part with their 
fathers in the choir ; which they ground on this passage in 
the book of Ezra,f " Then stood Joshua with his sons, Kad- 
miel and his sons, and sung together by course, in praising 
and giving thanks unto the Lord;" chap. iii. 9 — 11. 

As for instrumental music, though it was performed chiefly 
by the Levites, yet, the rabbies say, other Israelites who were 
skilful, if they were men of worth and piety, might bear a 
part.J This they ground on the account we have, that on 
occasion of David's fetching the ark from '* Kirjath-jearim, he 
and all the house of Israel played before the Lord on all 
manner of instruments ;" 2 Sam. vi. 5. 

In the temple choir there were both wind and stringed in- 
struments; the chief of the former was the mittfn chatsotserah, 
which we have spoken of before. The name of it is supposed 
to have had an affinity with, and to be formed from its sound . 
We find that this music attended at the service of the altar. 
Thus when Solomon and all the people offered sacrifices at 
the dedication of the temple, " the Levites played on instru- 
ments of music, and the priests sounded trumpets before 
them;" 2 Chron. vii. 6. And when Hezekiah purified the 
house of the Lord, and restored the temple service, and on 
that occasion offered sacrifices, " the Levites stood with the 
instruments of David, and the priests with the trumpets," 
2 Chron. xxix. 26; and so likewise in many other places. In 
both these passages the priests are said to sound the trumpets, 
and not the Levites, who played on other instruments. And 
thus, when David brought up the ark out of the house of 

"* Gnerachin in Mishn. cap. ii. sect. vi. ; Maimon. et Bartenor. in loc. et 
Gemara, fol. 11.6 ; Maimon. de Appar. Templi, cap. iii. sect. iii. 

f Glossa, ibid. J Maimon. de Apparatn Templi, ubi supra. 



t' HAP. V.] 



THE TEMPLE MUSIC. 



191 



Obed-edom, the Levites were appointed to be singers with 
instruments of music, psalteries, harps, and cymbals, and the 
priests did blow with the trumpets, 1 Chron. xv. 16 — 24, as 
it was prescribed in the law of Moses, " The son of Aaron 
the priest shall blow with the trumpets Numb. x. 8. 

According to the Hebrew doctors, there must be two trum- 
pets at least, Numb. x. 2, and not more than a hundred and 
twenty,* because that was the number used when the ark was 
brought into Solomon's temple ; 2 Chron. v. 12. They say, 
that in singing the psalms, the voices and instruments made 
three intermissions or pauses, which they call EWpnS) perakim, 
from |T"iD parak, rapit ; and that then the priests sounded the 
trumpets. So that Di'. Lightfoot says, the trumpets were 
never joined with the choir in concert, but sounded only when 
the choir was silent .+ However, in this he is undoubtedly 
mistaken ; for on the occasion above referred to, of bringing 
the ark into the temple, we find the trumpets, and voices, and 
cymbals, and other instruments of music, united in one grand 
chorus : " The trumpeters and singers were as one, to make 
one sound in praising the Lord ; and they lift up their voices 
with the trumpets and cymbals, and instruments of music, and 
praised the Lord 2 Chron. v. 13. 

Another wind instrument in use among the Jews, was the 
b*>bn chaiil, the pipe, flute, or hautboy. The rabbies say, it 
was used only on twelve days in the year ; J but it does not 
appear in Scripture, that it was ever used in the temple ser- 
vice. It is said, indeed, in Isaiah, " Ye shall have gladness 
of heart, as when one goeth with a pipe to come into the 
mount of the Lord, to the Mighty One of Israel Isa. xxx. 
29. But that may probably allude to the people's having 
music playing before them, when they came in companies 
from all parts of the country, to pay their worship at the na- 
tional altar on the three grand festivals. The b*>bn chalil, 

* Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. iii. sect. iv. Crenii Fascic. Sexti, 
p. 103; Mishn. in Gnerachin, cap. ii. sect, v.; et de Bartenor. in loc. ; et 
Maimon. in sect. vi. p. 197, 198, torn. v. edit. Surenhus. 

t Temple Service, chap. vii. sect. ii. 

X Maimon. ubi supra, sect. vi. ; Mishn. in Gnerachin, cap. ii. sect. iii. 
p. 196, torn. v. 



192 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[lJO.OK 1. 



might be a common instrument, used on that occasion, though 
not in the temple choir. 

The other musical instruments, chiefly used in the sacred 
service, were the D^33 nebhalim, nH3D kinnoroth, and the 
D*>rb}(n metsiltaim, which in the fifteenth chapter of the First 
Book of Chronicles we render psalteries, harps, and cymbals ; 
1 Chron. xv. 16. The nebhel, and the -tfD khutor, the 
psaltery and harp, are both said to be stringed instruments. 
Josephus describes the kinnor as having ten \op§ai, or strings 
(which, as the word signifies, were all open notes, in the 
manner of our harps, or harpsichords) ; and the nebhel as 
having twelve ^Soyyot, notes or sounds ; produced by stopping 
with frets in the manner of our viols ; for so Dr. Lightfoot 
imagines these two words should be explained. Josephus 
farther saith, that the kinnor was struck irXiiKTpo, with a quill, 
as we play on the dulcimer; and the nebhel twanged with the 
fingers, as we play on the lute.* But if they had got into the 
way, by stopping, of playing several notes on one string, in 
Josephus's time, I much suspect they had not that contrivance 
in David's ; because he seems to speak of an instrument of ten 
strings as the grandest and most excellent of all, on account 
of the number of its strings: Psalm xxxiii. 2; xcii. 3; cxliv.9. 
Whereas if they had had the way of stopping them, as we do 
the violin, I can see no sufficient reason, why such a number 
of strings should be reckoned a mark of excellence, when fewer 
would have reached as large a compass as they had ever occa- 
sion for. It seems, therefore, as if ten open strings, or ten notes, 
was the whole compass of their music in those days. And to 
this time the eastern music hath but a small compass of notes. 

The bxbx tseltsel, which both the Septuagint, in 1 Chron. 
xv. 16, and Josephusf translate Kv/jijdaXov, the cymbal, seems 
to have been neither a wind nor stringed instrument, but 
something made of metal, which gave a sound with striking 
upon it, without any variety of notes, like a bell. Josephus 
gives no other description of cymbals, but that they were great 
and broad, and made of brass. Mr. Lampe has written a 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. vii. cap. xii. sect. viii. edit. Haverc; and Lightfoot's 
Temple Service, ubi supra 
f Ubi supra. 



CHAP. V.] THE TEMPLE MUSIC. 



193 



treatise de Cymbalis Veterum. And Sir Richard Ellis, who 
hath one on the same subject in his Fortuita Sacra, shows 
the ancient cymbals were generally two brass hemispheres, or 
basons, which the musicians struck against one another with 
great address, in time to the song or other music which they 
accompanied. This is the instrument to which the apostle 
alludes, when he compareth a professor of religion without 
charity or love, to " the sounding brass or tinkling cymbal 
1 Cor. xiii. 1. The Hebrew name bxbx tseltsel, is probably 
taken from its repeated, uniform sound ; and so may the 
Greek word akaXa^ov, which we translate by a like, namely, 
tinkling. Perhaps our kettle-drums may be supposed to suc- 
ceed the cymbals of the ancients, though, if the rabbies say 
right, there was but one cymbal in the temple concert,* and 
it could not, therefore, answer the same end our kettle-drums 
do ; which are always placed in pairs, and being tuned at a 
fourth to each other, make an agreeable bass to the trumpet. 

There are some other instruments, of which we have no re- 
maining description, mentioned in the hundred and fiftieth 
Psalm, as used in praising God, but whether in the temple- 
service does not appear. The use of instrumental music in 
public worship was one of the typical ceremonies of the Jew- 
ish religion, which is abrogated, therefore, with the rest, by the 
gospel dispensation, and there is no revival of this institution 
in the New Testament. The ancient fathers were so far 
from practising or approving instrumental music in Christian 
worship, that some of them would hardly allow it was used in 
the Jewish, but put allegorical interpretations on the texts 
that mention it. The unknown author of the Commentary on 
the Psalms, in St. Jerome's works, makes the instrument of ten 
strings, to signify the ten commandments, in Psalm xxxiii. 2, 
and xliii. 4, &c. And he hath this notable observation on 
the following passage, " Praise him with stringed instruments 
and organs," Psalm cl. 4: that the guts being twisted by rea- 
son of abstinence from food, and so all carnal desires subdued, 
men are found fit for the kingdom of God, to sing his praise. 
St. Basil calls musical instruments the invention of Jubal, of 
the race of Cain.f And Clement of Alexandria says, they 

* Mishn. ubi supra, sect. v. ; Maimon. ubi supra, sect. iv. 

t Comment, in Isaiah, cap. v. apudOper. torn. i. p. 56, edit. Paris, 1618. 

o 



194 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



are better for beasts than men.* That musical instruments 
were not used even in the Popish church in Thomas Aquinas's 
time, about the year 1250, appears from this passage in his 
questions :f "In the old law, God was praised both with 
musical instruments and human voices ; but the Christian 
church does not use instruments to praise him, lest she should 
seem to Judaize." So that it seems, instrumental music hath 
been introduced into Christian worship within about the last 
five hundred years, in the darkest and most corrupt times of 
Popery. It is retained in the Lutheran church, contrary to 
the opinion of Luther, who, as Eckard confesses, reckoned 
organs among the ensigns of Baal. Organs are still used in 
some of the Dutch churches, but against the minds of their 
pastors ; for in the national synod at Middleburgh, anno 1581, 
and in that of Holland and Zealand, anno 1594, it was re- 
solved that they would endeavour to obtain of the magistrates, 
the laying aside of organs, and the singing with them in 
churches.J The Church of England also, in her homilies, 
strongly remonstrates against the use of organs, and other 
instruments of music in churches. In the homily on the place 
and time of prayer, after mention of piping, singing, chant- 
ing, and playing on organs, which was in use before the Re- 
formation, we are exhorted f< greatly to rejoice, and give 
thanks to God that our churches are delivered out of these 
things, that displeased God so sore, and so filthily defiled the 
holy house and place of prayer." I only add, that the voice 
of harpers and musicians, and of pipers and trumpeters, is 
mentioned among the glories of the mystical Babylon, " that 
mother of harlots and abominations of the earth, whom God 
will destroy with the sword of his mouth, and with the bright- 
ness of his coming f Rev. xviii. 22. But to return to the 
Levites. 

The third class were the porters, to whose charge the se- 
veral gates of the courts of the sanctuary were appointed by 
lot; 1 Chron. xxvi. 1. 13. 19. " They waited at every gate ; 
and were not permitted to depart from their service f 2 Chron , 

* Psedag. lib. ii. cap. iv. init. 

f Secunda secundae Questio xci. art. iv.- conclus. iv. 

% Vid. Apolog. (Hicmanni) pro Ministris in Angla Nonconformists, p, 

139, 



C HAP. 1.] 



THE LEVITES. 



195 



xxxv. 15: and they attended by turns in their courses, as the 
other Levites did; see 2 Chron. viii. 14. 

Their proper business was to open and shut the gates, and 
to attend at them by day, as a sort of peace-officers, in order 
to prevent any tumult among the people; to keep strangers, 
and the excommunicated and unclean persons, from entering 
into the holy court ; and, in short, to prevent whatever might 
be prejudicial to the safety, peace, and purity of the holy 
place and service. 

The rabbies assign several particular works to these porters, 
as brushing the gate, cleaning the gilding, 8tc, which pro- 
bably belonged to their office, as they had the charge of the 
sacred buildings, but of which there is no occasion to speak 
distinctly. 

They also kept guard by night about the temple and its 
courts ; and they are said to have been twenty-four,* including 
three priests, who stood sentry at so many different places. 
There was a superior officer over the whole guard, called by 
Maimonidesf " the man of the mountain of the house;" he 
walked the round as often as he pleased ; when he passed a 
sentinel that was standing, he said, "Peace be unto you;" 
but if he found one asleep, he struck him, and he had liberty 
to set fire to his garment. This custom may, perhaps, be al- 
luded to in the following passage : " Behold, I come as a thief," 
that is, unawares ; " blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth 
his garments ;" Rev. xvi. 15. The hundred and thirty-fourth 
Psalm seems to be addressed to these watchmen of the tem- 
ple, "who by night stand in the house of the Lord;" in 
which they are exhorted to employ their waking hours in acts 
of praise and devotion. Thus the Levites, as it is said in 
the First Book of Chronicles, were employed in the work day 
and night; 1 Chron. ix. 33. Godwin observes, " that some 
of the Levites had the charge of the treasures of the temple." 
It is said, that "of the Levites, Ahijah was over the trea- 
sures of the house of God, and over the treasures of the 
dedicated things ;" 1 Chron. xxvi. 20. But I do not 
conceive it was a distinct class of Levites that was en- 

* Maimon. de JEdificio Templi. cap. viii. sect. iv. Crenii FascicuL Sexti, 
p. 70. 

f Ibid. sect. x. p. 71, 72. 

o 2 



196 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



trusted with the treasures and dedicated thing's, but rather that 
herein they acted as assistants to the priests, or as inferior 
officers under them, it appearing that the high-priest, and 
others of the chief of the priests, had the charge of those 
things as well as the porters, who might probably have the 
immediate care of them under their superior direction. " The 
king commanded Hilkiah, the high-priest, and the priest of the 
second order, and the keepers of the doors, to bring forth out 
of the temple of the Lord all the vessels that were made for 
Baal/' &c; 2 Kings xxiii. 4. Godwin adds, that " others 
of the Levites were overseers and judges," DntDitf shoterim, 
and D^Dttf shophetim, as they are called in the Frst Book of 
Chronicles, chap, xxiii. 4; where six thousand Levites are 
said to have been appointed to these offices in David's time. 
For though God had ordered, in the law of Moses, that they 
should appoint D^tODli* shophetim, and DnDttf shoterim, in all 
their gates, Deut. xvi. 18; yet it should seem, that order and 
appointment had been much neglected ; the heads of the tribes, 
perhaps, having taken upon them to judge and determine 
controversies in their respective tribes, only in causes of great 
moment allowing an appeal to the king; for that David used, 
himself, to act as judge, and determine controversies between 
his subjects, may be concluded from the following passage: 
" When any man that had a controversy came to the king for 
judgment, then Absalom called unto him, and said, Of what 
city art thou ?" &c, 2 Sam. xv. 2. But when David was in- 
troducing his son Solomon to the throne, he was desirous of 
settling the inferior courts, according to the original institu- 
tion, well knowing that was the likeliest way of preserving the 
peace, and consulting the welfare of the nation. Accordingly, 
he restored these judicatories to their ancient order, and con- 
stituted Levites to be officers and judges. 

We have had an occasion already to speak of the distinc- 
tion between the D^IDDt^ shophetim and DviIDitf shoterim; and 
we then observed, that the OWDW shophetim were the supe- 
rior magistrates or judges, as may be concluded from that 
title's being applied to the chief magistrate under God, or the 
temporary viceroy, for several ages. As for the Dv-iBltf sho- 
terim, they seem to have been the inferior officers in the ju- 
dicatory courts, who attended the superior, and are therefore 



(II A P. V.] THE LEVITES. 197 

continually mentioned along with them, who, by whatever title 
they are distinguished, whether judges, rulers, elders, or cap- 
tains, still had their DntDitf shoterim : Deut. i. 15; xvi. 18; 
Josh. viii. 33; 2 Chron. xix. 11; Prov. vi. 7. But in this 
account of David's appointment of the Levites to their offices, 
1 Chron. xxiii. 4, quoted above, the D^UDltf shoterim are 
placed before the D^DSitf shophetim: so likewise in Josh. viii. 
33. From hence Dr. Patrick conjectures, we are not to take 
them for inferior persons, but for men of great authority, whom 
the Targum calls governors, who, like our justices of the peace, 
saw good order kept and the laws observed, while the province 
of the judges was the deciding causes in their several courts. 

Some think their judicial authority extended no farther than 
their own tribe, and the judging and determining controversies 
which arose among the inferior priests and Levites, especially 
about matters relating to the sacred ministry. But this 
opinion is hardly consistent with the account we have, that 
" Jehosaphat set of the Levites, and of the priests, along 
with the chief of the fathers of Israel, for the judgment of the 
Lord, and for controversies," 2 Chron. xix. 8; that is, all 
sorts of causes, both ecclesiastical and civil. And the Levites 
were the D^Oltf shoterim, officers, " under Amaziah, who was 
chief in all matters of the Lord;" and "under Zebadiah, the 
ruler of the house of Judah for all the king's matters," ver. 11. 

Upon the whole, it should seem the magistracy belonged, 
not to the Levites, or any class of them, merely as Levites, but 
only as they generally addicted themselves more to the study 
of the law, and had more leisure to attend on the duties of 
the magistracy, than other persons who were employed in 
secular business. 

The magistrates of different ranks, both the DMDDl^ shophe- 
tim and DnDttf shoterim* were very generally, though not al- 
ways, chosen out of that tribe. And thus the prophetic curse 
which Jacob pronounced upon Levi, that his posterity should 
be scattered amongst the tribes of Israel, Gen. xlix. 7, was 
remarkably accomplished (though in effect converted into a 
blessing), not only in respect to the appointment of their habi- 
tation (of which we shall take notice hereafter), but likewise 



* See above, p, 22 — 24. 



198 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK t. 



of their offices and employments ; more of them, than perhaps 
of all the other tribes together, being officers and judges 
throughout the whole country ; and, probably, as the rabbies 
tell us, some of them were generally directors of their semi- 
naries of learning.* 

Godwin observes, that the consecration of the Levites, in 
Moses's time, began at the twenty-fifth year of their age; in 
David's, at the twentieth; and " here," saith he, "we may 
note the liberty granted to the church in changing ceremonies." 
But he would undoubtedly have spared this note, if he had 
attended to what David declares, namely, that he had ap- 
pointed the courses of the priests and the Levites (which in- 
cluded the time of their entering on their ministry), and all 
the service of the house of the Lord, by the express order of 
God himself. " All this," says David, " the Lord made me 
understand in a writing by his hand upon me ;" 1 Chron. xxviii. 
13, 19. It does not, therefore, appear from hence, that there 
was any such liberty given to the church under the Old Tes- 
tament, as our author mentions, but rather the contrary; and, 
I apprehend, it will be hard to find it any where, either in 
the Old Testament or in the New. 

As for the consecration of the Levites, when they were 
offered by the priest, it is said, " Aaron shall offer them be- 
fore the Lord for an offering of the children of Israel," Numb, 
viii. 11. But the literal translation is, ft Aaron shall wave 
them for a wavering, or wave-offering, before Jehovah." 
The Targum renders it, " Elevabit Aaron Levitas elevatione 
coram Domino." This is a manifest allusion to an ancient 
sacrificial rite, namely, waving the sacrifices before the Lord. 
This waving was of two kinds; one called nftnn terumah, 
from DH rum, elevatus est, which, they say, was performed 
by waving it perpendicularly upward and downward ; the 
other, HD13JD tenuphah, from uuph, agitare, movere, which 
the Jewish writers tell us was performed by waving it hori- 
zontally, toward the four cardinal points, to denote the con- 
secration of what was thus waved to the Lord of the whole 

* See the authorities in Vitringa de Synag. Vetere, lib. i. part ii. cap. viii. 
p. 364, 365, who, however, looks upon this to be a rabbinical fiction. 
Dr. Lightfoot supposes the forty-eight cities of the Levites to have been a 
kind of universities. See his Harmony on Matt. ii. 4. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE LEVITES. 



199 



earth. # And this word is applied to the consecration of the 
Levites in the passage before quoted. The Septuagint ren- 
ders it by a(j}d)pi^co ; and as this word is used, in the history of 
the Acts, for the separation or consecration of Paul and 
Barnabas to the ministry of the gospel among the Gentiles, 
Acts xiii. 2, Godwin conceives, it is in allusion to the conse- 
cration and separation of the Jewish Levites to the ministry of 
the tabernacle. The same Greek word occurs concerning 
Paul in the Epistle to the Romans, where he saith of himself, 
that he was a^wpia^vog etg tvayysXiov, set apart for the gos- 
pel; Rom. i. 1. However, he may here allude, perhaps, to 
his having been a Pharisee, or itfnD pharosh, which coming 
from ttno pharash, separavit, signifies a^ivpiafiBvog ; and as 
before his conversion he gloried in being a Pharisee, afyupia- 
fiavog eig vo/xov, so he now does in being a^wpicr/jievog ug 
evayyeXiov. 

Another ceremony, at the consecration of the Levites, was 
imposition of hands : " Thou shalt bring the Levites before 
the Lord, and the children of Israel shall put their hands 
upon them;" Numb. viii. 10. By the ^nt£» VD bene Israel, 
children of Israel, some Jewish doctors understand the first- 
born^ in whose room the Levites were substituted; ver. 17, 
18. And their laying their hands, every one on the head of 
his substitute, had the same signification as the Levites laying 
their hands on the heads of the bullocks that were to be 
sacrificed for them, ver. 12, or to suffer and die in their room 
and stead; that is, denoting, not only their consecration to 
God, but their substitution to attend the service of God at his 
tabernacle, instead of the first-born. 

Or, if by the bxi\V*> ^33 bene Israel, we understand, with 
Dr. Patrick, the elders, as representatives of the whole as- 
sembly mentioned in the words preceding, we may suppose 
their laying their hands on the Levites was a form of benedic- 
tion ; as when Jacob laid his hand on Ephraim and Manasseh, 
and said, " God, before whom my fathers walked, bless the 
lads;" Gen. xlviii. 15, 16 : and as when little children were 

* Abarbanel, Bechai, and Levi Ben Gerson, quoted by Outram, de 
Sacrificiis, p. 162. 

f Vid. Ainsworth in loc. 



200 



oJEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



brought to our Saviour, that he might bless them, he laid his 
hands upon them ; Matt. xix. 15. 

This ceremony, used at the consecration of the Levites, 
came afterward into use at the consecration of other persons 
into either civil or sacred offices. Joshua was consecrated 
captain-general of the tribes of Israel by imposition of the 
hands of Moses ; Numb, xxvii. 18. And the same rite conti- 
nued in the Christian church at the ordination of officers, both 
ordinary and extraordinary ; particularly of the seven deacons, 
Acts vi. 6; of Barnabas and Saul to a special service, to 
which God called them, Acts xiii. 2, 3; and of ordinary 
pastors, 1 Tim. iv. 14, especially chap. v. 22. 

There is a difference, which Godwin observes, between ^ct- 
poOsma and xtiporovia, the former signifying the consecration 
of a persion to an office by the imposition of hands ; the latter, 
his election or choice by holding up of hands. It is derived 
from an ancient custom of the Athenians in the choice of their 
magistrates, among whom the candidates being proposed to 
the people, who signified their choice by holding up their 
hands, he who had most, was looked upon as duly elected.* 
Thus there was a brother, ^iporovnOeig ano twv tKK\r)<riwv, ap- 
pointed by the suffrage of the churches to travel along with 
Paul, to convey their alms to the poor saints in Judea; 
2 Cor. viii. 19. And in the history of the Acts we are in- 
formed, that Paul and Barnabas having travelled to Derbe, 
Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, had been there employed in 
appointing, by suffrage, elders in every city, \upoTovr)<javTtq 
avroig irpzafivrtpovQ tear CK/cArjaiav, Acts xiv. 23; a form of 
expression which intimates, that they referred it to the people 
to choose their own presbyters or pastors, in whose ordination 
they assisted. t 

Before we dismiss the consideration of the Levites, it will 
be proper to take notice of the place of their ordinary resi- 
dence, and of their subsistence. 

* Aristophan. in E/c/c\?j<r. p. 371. Vid. Suiceri Thesaur. in verb. x el P°- 
rovia, who quotes Demosthenes and iEschines, to show that this Attic 
custom was expressed by the word x ei P 0T0Via - Vid. etiam Constantini Lex- 
icon in verb, x^poroveco, et x i£l P orovia - 

f Vid. Witsii Maletem. de Vita Pauli, sect. iii. paragr. xx. p. 53 — 55. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE LEV ITES . 



201 



As to their residence, they, as well as the priests, were pre- 
cluded by the law from sharing the promised inheritance of 
Canaan with their brethren of the other tribes, Deut. xviii. 
1, 2: " The priests, the Levites, and all the tribe of Levi, 
shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel ; they shall have 
no inheritance among their brethren." The meaning is, they 
were to have no tract of land separately allotted to them as a 
tribe, in the same manner as the other tribes had ; but in lieu 
of that, they had forty-eight cities with their suburbs assigned 
them out of the other tribes, thirteen of which belonged to the 
priests, and thirty-five to the rest of the tribe of Levi; Numb, 
xxxv. 1 — 8 ; Josh. xxi. It maybe observed, that the cities of the 
priests were, for the most part, in the tribes of Judah and Ben- 
jamin, and consequently nearer to Jerusalem, which stood in the 
confines of these two tribes ; whereas those of the Levites were 
divided to them by lot out of the other tribes on either side 
Jordan. And thus God converted Jacob's curse on Levi, 
which we spoke of before, into a national blessing, by dispers- 
ing the priests and Levites, whose office it was to preserve 
and teach knowledge, throughout the whole land. Dr. Light- 
foot makes these forty-eight cities to be so many universities, 
where the ministerial tribe studied the law, and diffused the 
knowledge of it through the nation.* Of these, six were ap- 
pointed cities of refuge, for protecting of persons from the 
rigour of the law, in case of involuntary homicide, of which 
we shall discourse in its proper place. The Levitical cities 
had suburbs and fields surrounding them, to the extent of 
three thousand cubits on every side : " The suburbs of the 
cities, which ye shall give unto the Levites, shall reach from 
the wall of the city and outward a thousand cubits round 
about; and ye shall measure from without the city on the east 
side two thousand cubits, on the south side two thousand 
cubits, on the west side two thousand cubits, on the north side 
two thousand cubits; and the city shall be in the midst. This 
shall be to them the suburbs of the cities ;" Numb. xxxv. 4, 5. 
To reconcile the seeming contradiction between the thousand 
and two thousand cubits, Junius supposes the latter number 
expresses the diameter of the suburbs, the city being ab- 

* See his chorographical century of the land of Israel, chap, xcvii. 



202 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK J 



stracted, from out to out. So that the whole territory belong- 
ing to the city reached no farther than a thousand cubits. * 
But Dr. Lightfoot follows the more probable opinion of 
Maimonides ;f namely, that the former thousand cubits 
were for suburbs, more properly so called; for out-houses, 
barns, stables, &c; and, it may be, for gardens of herbs and 
flowers : and the latter two thousand were for fields and vine- 
yards^ which are called the ft fields of the suburbs," Lev. 
xxv. 34. From the produce of these fields and vineyards 
arose some part of the subsistence of the priests and Levites, 
when they were not in waiting at the sanctuary ; for in the 
weeks of their attendance they were maintained by the dues 
arising from the sacrifices: as the apostle observes, " Do 
ye not know, that they who minister about holy things, live of 
the things of the temple ; and they who wait at the altar, are 
partakers of the altar?" 1 Cor. ix. 13. Beside these dues, 
the first-fruits, which were brought to the temple, and the 
money paid for the redemption of the first-born, contributed 
toward their subsistence. But when they were out of wait- 
ing, their maintenance partly, as we have said, arose from the 
glebes belonging to their cities; but chiefly from the tithes 
of the produce of the whole country, which the law allotted to 
the tribe of Levi : " Behold," saith God, " I have given the 
children of Levi all the tenth in Israel for an inheritance, for 
their service which they serve;" Numb, xviii.21. This tithe 
the people paid both from the animal and vegetable produce 
of their estates; from the seed of the lands, and the fruit of 
the trees; from the sheep and black cattle; Lev. xxvii. 30; 
2 Chron. xxxi. 5,6. It was paid immediately to the Levites, 

* Junius in loc. 

f Lightfoot, ubi supra, ab init.; vid. etiam Mishn. Sotah, cap. v. sect, 
iii.; Maimon. et Bartenora in loc. torn. iii. p. 248, edit. Surenhus. 

X Mr. Lowman understands trie thousand cubits to be the measurement 
of the suburbs every way from the walls of the city into the country ; and 
the two thousand cubits, the measurement from the beginning of the sub- 
urbs on the country side into the centre of the city. See his Civil Govern- 
ment of the Hebrews, p. 110. It is remarkable that the Septuagint reads 
two thousand in both places. And both Josephus and Philo mention only 
two thousand. Joseph. Antiq. lib. iv. cap. iv. sect. iii. torn. i. p. 204, edit. 
Haverc. et Philo de Sacerdotum Honoribus, sub finem, p. 645, edit. Colon. 
Allobr. 1613. 



CHAP. V. 



THE LEV1TES. 



203 



who probably received it, either on the spot where it was pro- 
duced, or, at least, in their several cities ; Nehem. x. 37. Out 
of this tithe the Levites paid a tenth part to the priests, Numb, 
xviii. 26 — 28, which is called their nonn terumah, or heave- 
offering, as we render it, to the Lord ; in like manner as the 
general tithe, paid by the people, is called their nonn teru- 
mah, ver. 24. Not that we are to suppose all their tithes 
were lifted up toward heaven, as were some of the obla- 
tions, in token of their desire that God might accept them ; 
but because they were so far of the same nature with the 
things offered to God by that rite, as to be separated and set 
apart for his use and service. In which sense all the offer- 
ings, or free donations to God, required for building him a 
sanctuary, are called nonn terumah , Exod. xxv. 2 ; which 
the Chaldee Paraphrase translates, " that which is sup- 
ported." 

Besides this tithe, which the people were to pay to the 
Levites, they were also to tithe the remaining nine parts, and 
of that tithe to make a feast, to be kept in the court of the 
sanctuary, or in some apartment belonging to it; or in case 
they lived so remote, that they could not with convenience 
carry this tithe thither in kind, they might sell it, and purchase 
provisions with the money when they came to the sanctuary; 
only adding a fifth part thereto : Deut. xii. 17, 18; chap. xiv. 
22—27; Lev. xxvii. 31. At this feast, which was kept in 
token of their thankfulness to God, for his providential boun- 
ties, they were to entertain, not only their own families and 
friends, but also the Levites. It is not expressly said how 
many of them were to be invited ; that was left to prudence, 
and to be determined by the quantity of provisions ; only in 
general the law is, "Thou shalt eat there before the Lord 
thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou and thy household, and 
the Levite that is within thy gate ; thou shalt not forsake 
him." Now that this tithe was different from that paid to 
the Levites is manifest, first, in that the tithe paid to them 
was for their own use ; whereas this was consumed by the 
owners and their friends ; only they were to invite some 
Levites to the feast. Secondly, That tithe was paid all the 
country over, this only at the sanctuary. Thirdly, The Le- 
vites were to pay a tenth of their tithe to the priests, which 



204 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



they could not do of this, having no property in it, except that 
they were to partake of it as invited guests. 

Besides these two tithes, Josephus,* and the apocryphal 
book, Tobit, chap. i. 8, speak of a third, paid once in three 
years ; which was given away in charity. And some Jewish 
writers, therefore, call it the poor man's tithe. f This opinion 
may seem to receive some countenance from the express order 
in the book of Deuteronomy, that at the end of every three 
years they should bring forth all the tithe of their increase, and 
lay it up within their gates ; that the stranger, the fatherless, 
and the widow, as well as the Levite, might come, and eat, 
and be satisfied; Deut. xiv. 28,29. Nevertheless, several 
learned Jews and Christians conceive this was not a distinct 
tithe, but the same with the second, with only this difference, 
that whereas, for two years together, the feast that was made 
by it, was kept at the sanctuary, the third year it was kept by 
the owners at their own house, in order that such of their poor 
neighbours and friends, as were aged and infirm, and could not 
travel to the place of the sanctuary, might not be wholly ex- 
cluded from this thanksgiving-feast ; or, as Mr. Mede ex- 
presses it, for two years together they paid the Levites' tithe, 
and the festival tithe ; but, in the third year, they paid the Le- 
vites' tithe, and the poor man's tithe ; that is, what was wont 
in other years to be spent in feasting, was every third year 
spent upon the poor.J But I acknowledge, that this third 
year's being called " the year of tithing," in the twenty-sixth 
chapter of Deuteronomy, ver. 12, seems to me to import, 
that some additional tithe was paid that year. 

The reason of God's commanding this tithe to be paid to 
the priests and Levites was manifestly for their subsistence. 
For as they had no estates in land, like the other tribes, ex- 
cept only in their cities, and a few little fields about them ; 
they must have starved without some such contribution from 
the other tribes. But why God would have them supported 
in this way, rather than by assigning them an inheritance, 

* Antiq. lib. iv. cap. yiii. sect. xxii. p. 238, edit. Haverc. 
f Maimon. de Jure Pauperis, cap. vi. sect. i. p. 60, edit. Prideaux, Oxon- 
1679. 

X See Mede's Works, booki. disc, xxxiii. p. 171, 172; and likewise Selden 
on Tithes, chap. ii. sect. iii. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE TITHES. 



205 



like the rest of the tribes ; and why this proportion of a tenth 
was to be paid them, rather than any other, are questions not 
so easy to be resolved. 

As to the former query, why God w r ould have the priests 
and Levites supported by tithes, rather than by alloting them 
an inheritance in land, it was, no doubt, partly, that their time 
might not be taken up with secular business, and their minds 
burthened about worldly cares and managing their estates, and 
that they might employ themselves wholly in the duties of 
their office ; as Timothy is exhorted by St. Paul, " to give 
himself wholly to his ministry and, for that end, cautioned 
against " entangling himself with the affairs of this life «*■' 
ITim. iv. 15; 2 Tim. ii. 4. 

Again, God's commanding the other Israelites to pay tithe 
out of their estates to his priests and Levites, might be de- 
signed as an acknowledgment, that they had received their 
estates from his free gift, and held them by no other tenure 
but his bounty. In which view the tithes may be considered 
as a quit-rent, to be annually paid to the original proprietor of 
the land, who had conquered it for them, and put them in pos- 
session of it.* Paying it to the priests and Levites, his im- 
mediate servants and ministers, for their maintenance and 
support, was paying it to him ; and as they held their estates 
by this tenure, a neglect or refusal was a forfeiture. To this 
effect is the observation of Rabbi Bechaif on the following 
words : " And thou shalt eat before the Lord the tithe of thy 
corn, of thy wine, and thy oil," &c; Deut. xiv. 23. If, saith 
he, thou pay the tithe, then it is thy corn, &c; if not, it is 
mine ; as it is said in the prophecy of Hosea, " Therefore 
will I return and take away my corn in the time thereof, and 
my wine in the season thereof chap. ii. 9. For they for- 

* When William the Conqueror parcelled out the lands of England, he 
reserved a certain small rent to be annually paid out of every estate to the 
Crown, as an acknowledgment, that it was received from, and held under 
him. This rent is paid to this day from all freehold estates, under the name 
of chief rent. Or if there be any estates that pay it not, it is because they 
have been purchased out of others, of which purchase it was made a con- 
dition that they should be clear of this incumbrance, those other estates 
paying it for them. 

f See Patrick in loc. 



206 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



feited the whole, who did not pay a tenth, the rent which God 
had reserved to himself. 

As for the second question, why God appointed the pro- 
portion of a tenth rather than any other, the Jews generally 
say, it was because ten is a perfect number, almost all na- 
tions ending their account of simple numbers with it, and then 
beginning again with compound numbers ; or, as others phrase 
it, this is the end of lesser numbers, and the beginning of 
greater ; on which account it was looked upon as the most 
perfect, and therefore had in great regard. But this is too 
frivolous. Perhaps a more substantial reason may be drawn 
from the ancient laws and customs of most nations, of paying 
a tenth to their kings. Aristotle mentions it as an ancient 
law in Babylon;* and Dr. Spencerf- observes, from a passage 
in Aristophanes, that it was the custom in Athens, though a 
commonwealth, for the people to pay a tenth to the magistracy. 
That this was reckoned a part of the jus regum, in the east- 
ern countries, appears from hence, that among the other op- 
pressions which Samuel tells the Israelites they might expect 
from a king, he mentions his demanding their tithes : " He 
will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and 
give to his officers, and to his servants 1 Sam. viii. 15. 
Now, as we have shown before, the priests and Levites were 
properly the officers and ministers of state, under God, as king 
of Israel; and the Israelites paying through their hands one- 
tenth to him, was agreeable to the custom of almost all na- 
tions to pay one- tenth to their king. Tithes, then, are to be 
considered as an appendage to the Theocracy ; and I appre- 
hend it will be extremely difficult to prove, that Christian 
ministers have a divine right to demand them, from this cir- 
cumstance of a constitution peculiar to the Jewish nation. 
Thus much concerning the priests and Levites. 

The rabbies speak of another sort of ecclesiastical persons, 
termed TQ^D stWN anshe mangnamidh, viri stationarii, J sta- 
tionary men ; of whom we have no mention in Scripture. 

* Aristot. (Economic, lib. ii. sub fin. 

f De Legibus Hebrseor. lib. iii. cap. x. sect. i. torn. ii. p. 721, 722, edit. 
Chappelow. 

X Vid. Maimon. de Apparatu Templi, cap. vi. per totum, p. 126, et seq. 
Crenii Fascic. Sexti. 



CHAP. V.] 



NETHINIM. 



207 



Nevertheless, there is some probability in the account of the 
Jewish doctors, that there were men chosen out of the several 
tribes, as representatives to attend at the sacrifices offered for 
all Israel ; the law requiring, that the persons for whom sacri- 
fices were offered should be present at the offering: Lev. i. 
3. 4; chap. iii. 2 — 8. Among the sacrifices offered for all 
Israel, or for the whole congregation, were the continual 
daily sacrifices, provided at the public charge ; and extraor- 
dinary sacrifices, when, on account of the sin of any particular 
person or persons, any judgment of God lay upon the whole 
nation; as in the case of the Israelites being worsted by the 
Canaanites at Ai, on account of Achan's transgression : in 
such cases the law directed, that " the congregation should 
offer a young bullock for the sin, and burn him before the 
tabernacle of the congregation;" Lev. iv. 13, 14. On the 
annual fast, or day of expiation, there was likewise a solemn 
sacrifice of atonement offered for all Israel, " because of their 
transgressions, in all their sins;" Lev. xvi. 16. On such oc- 
casions, it being impossible that all the people should be pre- 
sent, there were representatives chosen, say the doctors, for 
the whole body ; who, being divided into twenty-four courses, 
attended by rotation, as the priests and Levites did. 

The Nethinim, who come next under consideration, were 
so called from \r\) nathan, dedit, because they were given to 
the Levites for servants, or slaves, to do the drudgery belong- 
ing to the sacred service. Ezra says, they were given or 
appointed by David and the princes for the service of the 
Levites; chap. viii. 20. They were originally the Gibeonites, 
who obtaining a league of peace with the Israelites, soon after 
they came into Canaan, by artifice and fraud, were condemned 
by Joshua to the lowest and most laborious offices belonging to 
the service of the tabernacle; drawing water, fetching and cleav- 
ing wood for the fire of the altar, &c. ; Josh. ix. 3, to the end. 

We never find them called Nethinim before David's time ; 
but afterwards, when the Israelites had enlarged their con- 
quests, and probably added others of other nations to these 
vassals of the sanctuary, they were no longer called Gibeon- 
ites, but Nethinim, a name that would suit those of one na- 
tion as well as another. From this time they do not seem to 
have been considered and treated like slaves, but rather as 



208 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



the lowest order of the servants of the sanctuary, having, no 
doubt, embraced the Jewish religion. At their return from 
the captivity they were placed in cities with the Levites : 
Nehem. xi. 3 ; Ezra ii. 70; 1 Chron. ix. 2. There were very 
few, indeed, that chose to return ; probably, because of the 
lowness of their condition and station amongst the Israelites. 
We read of no more than two hundred and twenty, who came 
with Ezra, chap. viii. 20 ; and three hundred ninety-two with 
Zerubbabel; chap. ii. 58: a number so insufficient for the 
service-work of the temple, that Josephus tells us they insti- 
tuted a festival, which they called ZvXoQopta, on which the 
people were obliged to carry a certain quantity of wood, to 
supply the altar of burnt-offerings. # The Papists have a sort 
of officers in imitation of the I^ethinim, whom they call sub- 
deacons ; whose business it is to carry a bason of water, and 
a towel, to the priests who minister at the altar, to wash their 
hands before they celebrate mass. 

Of the Sacrifices. 

To this chapter, concerning the ministers of the sanctuary, 
may properly be subjoined a brief account of that part of its 
service, in which they were chiefly employed, namely, the 
sacrifices. 

Of their first institution we have no certain information in 
Scripture. But they were practised, we find, in the first ages 
of the world by Cain and Abel, Gen. iv.; and by our first pa- 
rents, probably, presently after the fall. For we read, that 
" unto Adam and to his wife the Lord made coats of skins, 
and clothed them;" Gen. iii. 21. As animal food was not 
used till after the flood, which we formerly proved,f we can- 

* Joseph, de Bell. Judaic, lib. ii. cap. xvii. sect. vi. p. 194, edit. Ha- 
verc. 

f Since we considered this subject, Dr. Sykea, in his late Essay on the 
Nature, Design, and Origin of Sacrifices, in order to explain the animal 
sacrifice which Abel offered, consistently with his own notion of sacrifices 
in general, namely, that they were a kind of eating and drinking with God 
as it were at his table, and in consequence of that being in a state of friend- 
ship with him by repentance and confession of sins (p. 1 20) ; hath endea- 
voured to show, in opposition to Grotius and Le Clerc, that animals were 
used for food before the flood. And as these authors think the express 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



209 



not easily imagine whence they so soon procured these skins, 
probably before any creatures had died of themselves, unless 
from beasts slain for sacrifice. 

grant of animal food made after the flood is sufficient proof that it was not in 
use before the flood, he inquires into the meaning of the respective grants to 
Adam and Noah (p. 167—178). 

The former is in these words (Gen. i. 29, 30) : " Behold, I have given you 
every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every 
tree in the which is the fruit of a tree bearing seed ; to you it shall be for 
meat. And to every beast of the field, and to every fowl of the air, and 
to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, have 
I given every green herb for meat." And the Doctor, remarking, that this 
grant must necessarily be understood with some limitations, some creatures 
being not formed for living upon herbs, and some herbs being of a poisonous 
quality, infers from hence, that it was not intended to intimate, that this or 
that food was prohibited, and not to be eaten by man, but to declare in 
general, how well God had, in his infinite wisdom, provided for the numerous 
species of creatures which he had created. But I apprehend, that, if we 
should allow there were noxious vegetables before the fall, when this grant 
was made, it is not a very natural inference, that, because it was to be limited 
to those herbs that were salutary in their nature, it might for that reason be 
extended to animal food, of which kind of food there is not the least men- 
tion. It is a maxim, that permissive laws are to be restrained to those ob- 
jects which are expressly declared in them, or at least to those which are of 
the same nature, and are evidently comprehended in the general ground and 
reason of the law. 

With respect to the grant to Noah, " every moving thing that liveth shall 
be meat for you, even as the green herb have I given you all things," Gen. 
ix. 3, he apprehends it does not imply any grant of animal food in general, 
but only of some particular sorts of it, such as are included in the word 
&*D"1 remesh, here rendered " moving," which, according to him, signifieth 
creeping things, or such animals as are not comprehended under the words, 
beast and fowl. Consequently, whatever is the meaning of this grant, it may 
be consistent with men's eating sheep and oxen, goats, and the like animals, 
from the first. But this criticism is without foundation, for it is certain that 
remesh is of very general signification, and used for all kinds of ani- 
mals, or all that can move. As in the following passages : " All flesh died 
that moveth, ii*D"in haromesh, upon the face of the earth, both of fowl, and 
of cattle, and of every beast and creeping thing ;" Gen. vii. 2 1 . Again, " God 
created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, l^D^n haromesh, 
which the waters bring forth abundantly," Gen. i. 21; that is, all kinds of 
fishes. When, therefore, God gave to Adam dominion over the fishes of the 
sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over every living thing that moveth 
JYiTD")n haromesheth, upon the face of the earth, ver. 28 ; the ti'DI or r)£73"l 
remesh, or remesheth, cannot here be understood to denote a particular species 

P 



210 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



Whether men were led to the practice of sacrificing by their 
own reason, or by the command of God, hath been a matter 
of controversy both among Jews and Christians. Some of 
the Hebrew doctors are of the former opinion, # in which 
they are followed by Chrysostom ; who saith, that Abel sacri- 
ficed the firstlings of his flock voluntarily, and from the motion 
of his own conscience, without any instruction or any positive 
law.f And the author of the questions and answers to the 
orthodox, in the works of Justin Martyr, asserts, that all who 
offered animals in sacrifice before the law of Moses, did it 
without any divine command ; nevertheless, God accepted the 
offering, and was pleased with the offerer. J Grotius declares 
himself of the same opinion,^ and produces, among others, 
the following passages in support of it : the first out of the 
prophet Jeremy: " For I spake not unto your fathers, neither 
commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the 
land of Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices;" Jer. 
vii. 22. Again, out of the Psalms, " I will not reprove thee 
for thy sacrifices, or thy burnt-offerings, to have been con- 
tinually before me. I will take no bullock out of thy house, 
nor he-goats out of thy folds. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, 
or drink the blood of goats ? Offer unto God thanksgiving, 
and pay thy vows unto the Most High;" Psalm 1. 8 — 14. 

of animals different from fishes and fowls, but all sorts of animals, or any 
other that can move, as well as those particularly named. 

The Doctor understands the latter clause, "the flesh with the blood, which 
is the life thereof, thou shaft not eat," to be only a prohibition of eating- 
animals w'hich died of themselves, and an injunction to kill before they eat. 
A prohibition and injunction, which, if men used animal food before tire 
flood, seems difficult to be accounted for, unless upon supposition that it was 
their practice to feed on animals which died of themselves, and that they 
did not kill them for food ; which is very unlikely, since it is certain, and 
Dr. Sykes admits, they killed them for sacrifice. 

Upon the whole, therefore, notwithstanding all the Doctor hath advanced, 
I cannot see reason to depart from the opinion I before espoused, that there 
was no permission to eat animal food till after the flood. 

* Maimonides, Rabbi Levi Ben Gerson, and Abarbanel; vid. Outram. 
de Sacrificiis, p. 9. 

f Horn. xii. ad Popul. Antioch. tonl. ii. edit. Benedict, p. 129. 

X -Rcspons. ad Qusest. lxxxiii. apud Opera Justin, p. 442, edit. Paris, 1615. 

§ Vid. Annot. in Gen. iv. 3, et in Jerem. vii. 22, prsecipue, de Veritat. 
Relig. Christ, lib. v. sect. viii. 



CHAP. V.] SACRIFICES. 211 

And in another place, "Thou desirest not sacrifice, else would 
I give it. Thou delightest not in burnt-offerings Psalm 
li. 16. Once more, " Sacrifice and offering thou didst not 
desire; mine ears hast thou opened. Burnt-offering and sin- 
offering hast thou not required ;" Psalm xl. 6. In all which 
passages, and some others that might be mentioned, the 
blessed God seems to speak with contempt of sacrifices, not 
only as unprofitable to him, but as if he did not command 
them. As for those in the Psalms, they must certainly be 
understood, either in a comparative sense, as importing that 
sacrifices were not so pleasing to him as moral obedience ; or 
as expressing their insufficiency to make a proper atonement 
for sin ; according to the apostle, " It is not possible, that 
the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins," Heb. 
x. 4; and as reproving, therefore, the vain dependence of those 
who rested upon them for pardon and divine acceptance, with- 
out looking by faith to their great antitype, the sacrifice of 
Christ. It cannot be supposed the Psalmist meant that God 
had not instituted sacrifices, because we know he had done it 
long before his time, by Moses. But the passage in the pro- 
phet Jeremy, that God " spake not unto the fathers, nor com- 
manded them, concerning burnt-offerings and sacrifices," being- 
said expressly to relate to a time prior to the giving of the law 
at Mount Sinai, namely, to the day of their deliverance out 
of the land of Egypt ; it is from hence inferred, that he did 
not institute sacrifices before the promulgation of the law by 
Moses. This opinion is zealously patronized by the Papists, 
in favour of their will-worship, or appointing religious rites 
and ceremonies without any divine institution ; for so, they 
allege, did the patriarchs in case of sacrifices ; yet God ap- 
proved, though he did not command them. The same notion 
is also embraced by some Protestants, in order to evade the 
argument drawn from the typical sacrifices of atonement, to 
prove the death of Christ a proper expiatory sacrifice. Sacri- 
fices, they plead, were at first a human institution, and to 
prevent their being offered to idols, God condescended to the 
introducing them into his service ; not that he approved them 
as good in themselves, or as proper rites of worship. How- 
ever, those who apprehend that sacrifices were originally of 
divine institution, reply, — 

p 2 



212 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



1st. That Abel is said to have " offered his sacrifice by 
faith," Heb. xi. 4; which must imply, as its ground and foun- 
dation, some divine promise connected with that rite, and con- 
sequently a divine direction for the performance of it. 

Dr. Spencer maintains, that sacrifices were originally con- 
sidered under the notion of gifts, the effect of which in ap- 
peasing the anger and conciliating the favour of men being 
observed, it was supposed they would have the like effect 
with God, and thereupon was invented the rite of sacrificing.* 

But to this it may be replied, that if both Cain and Abel 
sacrificed upon this principle, which must be acknowledged 
to be a wrong one, it will be hard to account for God's ac- 
cepting the one, and rejecting the other. Besides, as Dr. 
Kennicott very justly observes, the opinion, that sacrifices 
would prevail with God, must proceed from an observation, 
that gifts had prevailed with men ; an observation, which 
Cain and Abel had little opportunity of making.f Not to 
insist on what he further urges, that gifts could not have 
been in use till property was established ; which it probably £ 
was not in the days of Cain and Abel. 

2dly. The paschal lamb was expressly instituted by God 
himself, not only before the giving the law at Sinai, but before 
the migration of the Israelites from Egypt ; and that this was 
a real sacrifice is certain, it being called " the sacrifice of the 
Lors p assover," Exod. xii. 27 ; and it being elsewhere said, 
"Thou shalt sacrifice the passover unto the Lord thy God," 
Deut. xvi. 2; see also ver. 5, 6. Again, Christ, under the 
notion of our " Passover," is declared " to be sacrificed for 
us;" 1 Cor. v. 7. When therefore it is said in Jeremiah, that 
*' God did not speak unto the fathers concerning sacrifices in 
the day that he brought them out of Egypt," it cannot mean 
that he had yet instituted no sacrifices at all. Again, farther, 

3dly. If we consider how highly God hath resented, and 
how severely he hath punished will-worship in other cases ; 
particularly with respect to Nadab and Abihu's burning in- 

* Spencer de Legibus Hebraeor. lib. iii. dissert, ii. cap. iii. sect i. ii. torn, 
ii. p. 762, 763. In the next chapter he attempts to prove at large, that 
sacrifices were of human origin, and not of divine institution. 

f Two Dissert, on the Tree of Life, and Oblations of Gain and Abel, p. 206. 

I Ibid. Append, p. 252 — 254. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



213 



cense with strange fire, which the Lord commanded them not, 
on which they were struck dead on the spot, Lev. x. 1, 2; 
one cannot surely suppose, he would have so highly approved 
of the patriarchs' sacrificing, as he did, if he had not com- 
manded it. 

When God, therefore, saith, in the words so often cited, 
" I spake not unto the fathers, nor commanded them, in the 
day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning 
burnt-offerings and sacrifices, " it must be taken in connexion 
with the words immediately following, " But this thing com- 
manded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your 
God, and ye shall be my people ; and walk ye in all the ways 
that I have commanded" (rather, shall command you),' 'that it 
may be well unto you and then, with Rabbi Solomon Jarchi, 
and Maimonides, we may understand, — 

1st. That after God had brought Israel out of Egypt, he 
did not first speak to them, and command them, concerning 
sacrificial rites, but concerning moral obedience. For the 
beginning of the law they date from the Israelites coming to 
Marah, three days after they had left the Red Sea, where 
" God made a statute and an ordinance, and where he proved 
them, and said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of 
the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, 
and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his 
statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I 
have brought upon the Egyptians ;" Exod. xv. 25, 26. And 
this being before the new institution of sacrifices at mount 
Sinai, they were in fact not first commanded concerning these, 
but concerning moral obedience.* So that these Jewish doc- 
tors understand the form of expression in Jeremy, as we must 
that of St. Paul, " Adam was not deceived, but the woman 
being deceived was in the transgression," 1 Tim. ii. 14; that 
is, Adam was not first deceived, and was not first in the trans- 
gression, but Eve. 

2dly. These words may be very well understood in a com- 
parative sense : " God did not command the fathers concern- 
ing sacrifices, but this he commanded them, to obey his voice 
that is, he did not command them concerning sacrifices, so 

* Maimon. More Nevoch. part. iii. cap. xxxii. p. 436, Buxtorf. Basil, 
1629. 



214 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



much as concerning moral obedience ; " to obey being better 
than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams ;" 1 Sam. 
xv* 22. Accordingly, God is said to desire mercy, and not 
sacrifice, Hos. vi. 6; or mercy rather than sacrifice. In this 
manner negatives are frequently used for comparatives : " It 
was not you that sent me hither, but God," Gen. xlv. 8; not 
so much you, as God. " Your murmurings are not against 
us, but against the Lord," Exod. xvi. 8; not so properly 
against us, as the Lord. " Labour not for the meat that 
perisheth, but for the meat which endureth to everlasting life," 
John vi. 27; that is, not wTth so much assiduity and anxiety 
for the former, as for the latter. 

Upon the whole, then, it is most probable, sacrifices were 
first instituted by God himself, and enjoined our first parents 
presently after the fall ; from whom, and afterward from 
Noah, all nations received them by tradition.* 

However, in process of time these, as well as all the other 
branches of religious faith and worship, w T ere miserably cor- 
rupted ; instead of brute animals which God had appointed, 
human sacrifices grew into use, and it became no uncommon 
thing, in several countries, for parents to sacrifice their children. 
And besides this change, as to the subjects of the sacrifices, the 
objects of them were likewise altered ; the Gentiles " sacrificing 
to demons, and not to God;" 1 Cor. x. 20. When, therefore, 
God chose Israel to be his peculiar people and church, among 
whom he would revive the true religion, he gave them, anew, 
his law concerning sacrifices, with the addition of such parti- 
cular rites as would make them more significant types of good 
things to come under the gospel dispensation. For instance, 
whereas formerly the head of every family was, probably, the 
sacrificer for his own household, God now appointed a pecu- 
liar order of priests, with their assistants the Levites, whose 
whole business it should be to attend the sacrifices ; by whom, 
therefore, they would be more regularly performed, and better 
preserved from being corrupted, than in times past. It is 

* Against the human, and for the divine institution of sacrifices, see the 
ingenious and learned Dr. Kennicott's two Dissertations on the Tree of Life, 
and the Oblations of Cam and Abel, p. 201, et seq.; Witsii Miscell. torn. i. 
lib. ii. dissert, ii. sect. i. — xv. Dr. Outram hath discussed the arguments oh 
both sides without determining on either, De Sacrifices, lib. i. cap. i. sect. iii. iv. 
p. 2—11. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



215 



concerning these new instituted Jewish sacrifices we are now 
more especially to discourse. 

The general name sometimes includes all the offerings made 
to God, or any way devoted to his service and honour. Thus, 
not only offerings of fruits, as well as animals, are called sacri- 
fices ; but likewise the moral duties of repentance, thanks- 
giving, and praise : " The sacrifices of God are a broken and 
a contrite spirit;" Psalm li. 17. Again, "I will offer unto 
thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving;" Psalm cxvi. 17. And, 
" Let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God ;" Heb. xiii. 15. 

But, in a stricter sense, sacrifices and offerings were two 
things ; every sacrifice, indeed, was an offering, but every 
offering not a sacrifice. All sorts xrf tithes, and first-fruits, 
and whatever of their worldly substance was consecrated to 
God, for the support of his worship, and the maintenance of 
his ministers, were offerings, or oblations. These were either 
of living creatures, or other things ; as corn, flour, wine, oil, 
8cc. But sacrifices, in the more peculiar sense of the term, 
were of living creatures ; of which only five sorts were pre- 
scribed, or allowed by the law; three of beasts, namely, 
bullocks, sheep, or goats ; and two of birds, that is, doves and 
turtles. Beasts only were allowed in public sacrifices, and 
birds in private ones ; and that chiefly when persons were too 
poor to provide a more costly sacrifice. 

The general design and use of such offerings and sacrifices 
was partly, — ■ 

1st. As an acknowledgment of their receiving all their 
good things from the hand of God, and of his right in the 
whole of that of which they offered him a part: though to 
make this act the more significant and expressive, it was a 
part of almost every thing they had. 

2dly. To be a means of repentance and humiliation for sin, 
of the desert of which they were reminded by the suffering and 
death of the victim, substituted in their room, and suffering in 
their stead. 

3dly. To typify, and so to assist their faith in that promised 
sacrifice of atonement, which the Son of God was to offer in 
due time. There was also a political use of many of these 
sacrifices, which we have formerly taken notice of. Dr. Sykes* 
* Essay on the Nature, Design, and Origin of Sacrifices, p. 50, 



216 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



makes all sacrifices to be federal rites, which implied men's 
entering into friendship with God ; or if they had violated 
their friendship with him, then they denoted reconciliation, 
and a renewal of that friendship. He supposes the fire on the 
altar represented God, who was anciently wont to manifest 
himself in a shechinah, or flame ; as he did to Moses in the 
bush, and in the holy of holies in the Jewish tabernacle.* 
And accordingly, those sacrifices, part of which was consumed 
on the altar, and part eat by the offerers, signified their being 
in friendship with God, and their desire of continuing so ; eat- 
ing and drinking together being an ancient rite, and token of 
friendship among men. And the whole burnt-offering, in 
which all was given to God, being consumed on his altar, sig- 
nified their desire of reconciliation and renewed friendship 
with him ; and their acknowledgment of their unworthiness 
of it, as they eat of no part of the sacrifice.f 

But as for the notion of the victim's being substituted, to 
suffer death and be consumed in the room and stead of the 
transgressor, for whom it w r as offered, the Doctor allows it to 
have been ancient, and commonly received among Gentiles 
and Jews, as well as Christians.^ Thus Ovid, in the sixth 
book of his Fasti, supposes the sacrificed animal to be a 
vicarious substitute, the several parts of which w r ere given as 
equivalents for what was due by the offerers : 

Cor pro corde, precor ; pro fibra sumite fibras ; 
Hanc animam vobis pro meliore damus. 

Abarbanel espouses the same sentiment in his Introduction 
to his Comment on Leviticus :§ "The person," saith he, " that 
put his hand upon the head of the beast, by this rite confessed 
the desert of his sins, and declared the blood of that animal to 
be shed in lieu of his own ; and that it was just and right that 
the offender's life should be taken away, as was that of the 
beast brought to the altar." And Dr. Outram|| abundantly 
shows, that it was the common opinion of the rabbies, " that 
the blood of the sinner in equity ought to have been poured 

* Essay on the Nature, Design, and Origin of Sacrifices, p. 337. 
f Ibid. p. 232, 233. 277. J Ibid. p. 121. 

§ Abarbanel. Exord. Comment, in Levit. ad calcem Maimon. de Sacri- 
liciis per Du Viel, p. 301. 

|| Outram. de Sacrifices, lib. i. cap. xxii. sect. v.. — xii. p. 269 — 278. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



217 



out, and his body burnt, as was the blood of the victim poured 
out and its body burnt, and that God in his mercy and good- 
ness took the victim instead of, and as an expiation for, the 
offender." Thus they understand a translation of sin upon 
the head of the victim, and likewise of the punishment due to 
the offender. Dr. Sykes utterly rejects this notion of sacrifices 
being vicarious and expiatory, and endeavours to confute it 
with the following: arguments : — - 

] st. It is not anywhere expressly said, or so much as hinted, 
in the Old Testament, that the victim's life was given in lieu 
of, or as a vicarious substitute for, the life of him that offered 
it." # To this we answer, 

There was no need of its being expressly said, it being well 
known and universally understood to be the true intent and 
meaning of killing the victim. Of this fact numerous testi- 
monies might be added to those already cited, from the most 
ancient writers of several nations. It is strange he should 
say it is not so much as hinted in the Old Testament, where 
there are so many cases, in which a person having done some- 
thing, that, according to the law, forfeited his life, upon a 
victim's being slain and sacrificed for him, whereby an atone- 
ment was made for his transgression, the forfeiture was re- 
versed, and thereupon his life was spared. However, this 
notion is expressly advanced in the New Testament, in rela- 
tion to the death of Christ, which is said to be " an offering 
and sacrifice to God," Eph. v. 2 ; and he is said to have " put 
away sin by the sacrifice of himself," Heb. ix. 26 ; and to have 
suffered for sins, the just for the unjust," 1 Pet. iii. 18 ; and 
to have died for us in the same sense that one man may die 
for another, that is, to save the other from dying by suffering- 
death in his stead; Rom. v. 6 — 8. And this is founded on 
the supposition, that the victim's life was given in lieu of, or 
as a vicarious substitute for, the person for whom it was of- 
fered. 

2dly. The Doctor pleads, that in some cases, atonement 
was made for sin without any animal sacrifice, and without any 
life being given ; therefore, piacular sacrifice did not imply 
giving life for life.'f' Thus, when a poor man, who could not 
be at the expense of an animal sacrifice, had forfeited his life 
* Essay on Sacrifices, p. 122. f P. 123—126. 



218 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



by some transgression of the law, he was indulged with offer- 
ing a handful of fine flour only, and with that the " priest 
was to make atonement for the offender, as touching his sin 
that he had sinned 51V Lev. v. 13. 

I reply, This by no means proves, that when an animal 
piacular sacrifice was offered, it did not imply giving life for 
life. It only shows God mioTit, if he pleased, accept of a 
lower atonement for the forfeited life of the offender. And 
it is a remarkable instance of his compassionate indulgence to 
the poor, that he would accept of some flour only, to be 
burnt and destroyed on his altar, as a vicarious substitute for 
those lives or persons who deserved to be destroyed. 

3dly. The Doctor argues, that if the design of animal sacri- 
fices had been to give life for life, mactation alone would have 
been sufficient ; and there would have been no occasion for 
the subsequent rite of burning the blood upon the altar, that 
was to attend it. # To this we reply, 

If the only end and design of piacular sacrifices had been 
to give life for life, there might have been some weight in this 
argument. But as the transgressor of God's law had not only 
forfeited his natural life, but had incurred future punishment, 
it made the sacrifice more properly and significantly vicarious, 
that, after it was killed, the flesh should be burnt w T ith fire, 
and utterly consumed on the altar. And as for the miti- 
chah, or meat-offering, that was to attend it and be consumed 
along with it, it might naturally signify the forfeiture of their 
substance as w T ell as their lives, into the hands of divine 
justice. 

4thly. The Doctor observes, that no where, in the books 
that particularly mention the institution of sacrifices, or largely 
treat about them, or in the versions of them, are they ever 
called \vrpa, avriXvTpa, or avrcipv\a, equivalents, compensa- 
tions, exchanges, substitutes, or by any other word which 
implies giving life for life.f I answer, 

We are not much concerned what word the Septuagint, or 
any other version, hath used for sacrifices. But since the 
Doctor seems to allow, that if they were called \vrpa, or 
avriXvTpa, that would imply their vicarious substitution ; I think 
it a substantial argument, that they really were so, that the 

* P. 126—134. t P. 134, 135. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



219 



death of Christ, which is expressly said to be a sacrifice for 
the sins of men, is said to be a Xvrpov, Matt. xx. 28, Mark x. 
45; and avriXvrpov, 1 Tim. ii. 6. That no word is used in the 
books that mention the " institution of sacrifices, or so largely 
treat about them, which implies giving life for life," is posi- 
tively asserted ; and if we should assert, that the Hebrew 
word Ntttt Jiasa, portavit, snstinuit, which is so often used 
concerning piacular sacrifices, does naturally and strictly imply 
this, I am persuaded we should have reason and truth on our 
side. As this word is used for men's bearing their own sin, 
that is, suffering the punishment of it in their own persons, 
Lev. xxiv. 15; Numb. xiv. 34, et alibi; and for one man's 
bearing the sins of another, that is, suffering the punishment 
which the other's sins had deserved, Ezek. xviii. 20; so it is 
also used for the sin-offering, which is said to " bear the ini- 
quity of the congregation, and to make atonement for them 
before the Lord," Lev. x. 17 : where, to bear the iniquity of 
the congregation, and to make atonement for their sins, are 
plainly the same thing; and to bear the iniquity of the con- 
gregation, according to the common use of the word twi nasa, 
is to suffer the legal result of their iniquity, or, which comes to 
the same, a vicarious death and punishment for them. And 
thus Christ is said to have " borne our griefs and carried our 
sorrows," Isa. liii. 4, and to " bear the sins of many," ver. 12. 
Once more, 

5thly. The Doctor observes, that atonement is required to 
be made by animal sacrifices, in some cases, where there was 
no crime committed, and therefore no life forfeited. # A 
woman after child-bearing is commanded to bring a lamb, or, 
if not able to do that, two turtle-doves or two young pigeons, 
" the one for a burnt-offering, the other for a sin-offering; and 
the priest should make an atonement for her;" Lev. xii. 8. 
Again, certain animal sacrifices are appointed for the cleansing 
of a leper, Lev. xiv. 10 — 21, by which the priest was to make 
" an atonement for him;" ver. 21. From these two cases the 
Doctor argues, that, as in neither of them any crime is sup- 
posed to be committed, nor life forfeited, therefore no vica- 
rious death and punishment could be supposed to be inflicted 
on the victim; and consequently, the common notion of a 
* P. 135—141. 



220 



jp:vvish antiquities. 



[book i. 



substitution in piacular sacrifices, which has so much prevailed 
in the world, does not at all enter into the Scripture notion 
of making atonement. 

But here I would ask, if those persons for whom atonement 
was made were not guilty of sin, why was any atonement 
made for them; since the Doctor himself tells us, that "to 
make atonement for sins, is to do something, by means of 
which a man obtains the pardon of them." # We allow the 
woman had not properly contracted guilt by her child-bearing, 
nor the leper by his disease ; but, as the pains of child-bearing, 
and as all diseases to which the human body is incident (of 
which leprosy, according to the account travellers give of it, 
in the eastern countries, seems to be the most grievous), are 
the fruits and consequences of the apostacy, and of sin, which 
hath brought these calamities on human nature, it was highly 
proper, that, on occasion of a deliverance from these remark- 
able effects of sin, there should be an humble acknowledgment 
made of the desert of it in general, and a piacular sacrifice 
offered for original and for all actual transgressions; which I 
take to be the intent of such sacrifices on these occasions. 

Upon the whole, then, I see no reason, from any of 
Dr. Sykes's arguments, to depart from the ancient doctrine, 
which hath so universally approved itself to the reason of 
Gentiles as Well as Jews; namely, that in sacrifices of expia- 
tion and atonement for sin, there was a substitution of the 
victim to suffer in the room and stead of the transgressor. 

Sacrifices are distinguished by the Jewish writers into the 
most holy, and into those of an inferior kind, or less holy.f 
Of the former sort were the burnt-offerings, sin-offerings, 
trespass-offerings, and peace-offerings, of the whole congrega- 
tion; of the latter, they reckon the peace-offering of parti- 
cular persons, paschal lambs, firstlings, and tenths. Some of 
them distinguish them also into sacrifices of duty, to which 
they were bound by the law, and voluntary sacrifices, which 
they offered of their own free will. J 

* P. 306. 

f Mishn. tit. Zebachim, cap. v. sect. i. et vii. p. 21 et 25, torn v. edit. 
Surenhus. ; Maimon. de Ratione Sacrificiorum faciendomm, cap. i. sect. xvii. 
p. 290, Crenii Fascic. Sexti. 

X Vid. Reland. Antiq. Veterjiiri Hebraeor. part. iii. cap. i. sect. iii. p. 291, 
292, 3d. edit. Traject. Bat. 1717. 



chap, v.] 



SACRIFICES. 



221 



Whatever was offered in sacrifice was to be good and per- 
fect in its kind ; no beast that had any distemper, blemish, or 
defect, was allowed. 

In treating of this subject, we shall distinguish sacrifices in 
respect, 

1st. To their signification and use : 

2dly. To the persons that offered them : and, 

3dly. To the subject-matter of them. 

1st. In respect to their signification and use, they are dis- 
tinguished into four kinds — burnt-offerings, sin-offerings, tres- 
pass-offerings, and peace-offerings. * 

1st. The first and most ancient sort of sacrifices were burnt- 
offerings, which the Hebrews call rvhty gfioloth, from rhy gna- 
lah,ascendit ; the Greeks, oXoKauora, from 6\oe, tot us, and kcuw, 
uro ; because they were w T holly consumed with fire, except 
the skin, and so made to ascend in flames and smoke from the 
altar. Sacrifices of this sort are often mentioned by the Hea- 
thensf as well as Jews ; particularly by Xenophon, who 
speaks of sacrificing holocausts of oxen to Jupiter, and of 
horses to the sun. J They appear to have been in use long 
before the institution of the other Jewish sacrifices by the law 
of Moses. Abel's was most probably of that sort. However, 
we expressly read of burnt-offerings in Job's time, chap. i. 5; 
xlii. 8; and in Abraham's, Gen. xxii. 13; and as early as 
Noah, who, upon his coming out of the ark, " built an altar 
unto the Lord, and took of every clean beast and of every 
clean fowl, and offered burnt-offerings upon the altar;" Gen. 
viii. 20. 

Hence it w T as, that though the Jews would not allow the 
Gentiles to offer on their altar any other sacrifices peculiarly 
enjoined by the law of Moses, yet they admitted them by the 
hands of the Jewish priests to offer holocausts, this being a 

* This division is said by Maimonides and Abarbanel to comprehend 
every kind of sacrifices that the law prescribes, whether public or private. 
Vid. Maimon. de Ratione Sacrificiorum faciendorum, cap. i. sect. ii. p. 283, 
Crenii Fascic. Sexti ; et R. Abarbanel. Exord. Comment, in Levit. cap. ii. 
p. 243, ad calcem Maimon. de Sacrifices, per Du Viel ; see likewise Mai- 
mon. Praefat. ad Quintam Partem Mishnae, fol. 1. 

f Outram. de Sacrificiis, lib. i. cap. x. sect. ix. p. 113. 

X E3wav Tig Au, Kai iikoKavrojaav tqvq tclvqovq' nrura rip 'H\i<^, Kai 
iiXoKavro aav rovg i-rnrovg, Cyropsed. lib. viii. p. 464, edit. Hutchins.1738. 



222 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



sort of sacrifices prior to the law, and common to all nations.* 
During their subjection to the Romans, it was no uncommon 
thing for those Gentiles to offer sacrifices to the God of Israel 
at Jerusalem. There is a letter of king Agrippa to Caius in 
Philo's works, in which it was said, that the emperor Augustus 
ordered a holocaust of two lambs and a bullock to be offered 
for him daily, rw vipiario Oeio, to the Most High God, at Jeru- 
salem.f And hence Tertullian, in his apology to the Ro- 
mans, says, " cujus (Judeeae sc.) et Deum victimis, et templum 
donis, et gentem fcederibus, aliquandiu honorastis."J 

The Jews accounted their holocaust the most excellent of 
all their sacrifices. Accordingly it is so styled by Philo, in 
his book de Victimis, who begins with it, and assigns this 
reason for giving it the preference, that it redounds solely to 
the divine honour, being entirely consumed with fire, and 
leaving therefore no room for selfishness or avarice. § Moses 
likewise begins the law concerning sacrifices with those relat- 
ing to the holocaust or burnt-offering, Lev. i. initio ; and in- 
forms us, that the creatures proper for sacrifices were bullocks, 
sheep, or goats, and turtle doves-or young pigeons ; ver. 5. 
10. 14. The doves and pigeons were chiefly for the poorer 
sort of people, who could not go to the price of bullocks and 
sheep. The law enjoins a person who had been guilty in 
some articles particularly specified, " to bring his trespass- 
offering unto the Lord, a female from the flock, a lamb or a 
kid of the goats, for a sin-offering ; but if he be not able to 
bring a lamb, then two turtle doves or two young pigeons, 
one for a sin-offering;, and the other for a burnt-offering; ; Lev. 
v. 6, 7. And in like manner a woman, after child-bearing, is 
ordered to bring a lamb for a burnt-offering, and a dove or a 
pigeon for a sin-offering ; but if she be not able to bring a 
lamb, she shall bring two turtle-doves or two young pigeons, 
the one for a burnt-offering, the other for a sin-offering ; Lev. 
xii. 6. 8. It is observable, that the poor woman's offering 

* Mairaon. de Ratione Sacrificiorum faciendorum, cap. iii. sect. ii. p. 
300, Crenii Fascic. Sexti. 

f De Legatione ad Caium, apud Opera, p. 801, E. edit. Colon. Allobr. 
1613. 

X Tertullian. Apolog. sect. xxvi. p. 26, edit. Rigalt. 1675. 
§ Apud Opera, p. 648, B. C. edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613, 



CHAP. V.] 



ACR1FICES. 



223 



was that which the Virgin Mary made at her purification ; 
Luke ii. 24. 

The burnt-offering, as I said, was entirely consumed by 
fire : " It is the burnt-offering, because of the burning upon 
the altar all night until the morning, and the fire of the altar 
shall be burning in it;" Lev. vi. 9. Only the skin was the 
priest's due for the trouble of performing the sacrifice ;" chap, 
vii. 8. It is disputed among the Jewish doctors on what 
accounts the holocausts were offered. Some say, to expiate 
all evil thoughts, as sin-offerings and trespass-offerings all evil 
actions. Others say, to atone for the breach of affirmative 
precepts, as the latter did for that of negative ones.* 

Some Christian writers make the holocaust to be offered to 
God as an acknowledgment of his being the Creator, Lord, 
and Preserver of all, worthy of all honour and worship ; and 
likewise as a token or emblem of men's giving themselves up 
entirely to him, as they did the victim, which was wholly con- 
sumed on the altar. Accordingly it is supposed the apostle 
alludes to the holocaust, when he exhorts us to " present our 
bodies/' or ourselves, " a living sacrifice to God;" Rom. xii. 1. 

But farther, since the end of the offering was always to 
make atonement, as is declared in the general law concerning 
burnt-offerings, Lev. i. 4, which yet it could not do absolutely 
and properly, Heb. x. 1 — 4. 11 ; it must, therefore, be under- 
stood to do it typically, or in a way of representation. And 
this was, doubtless, its grand intention and use, even to 
typify, and to direct the faith of the Old Testament believers 
to that only true atoning sacrifice, which the Son of God was 
to offer in due time. Hence Christ is said to have " offered 
up his body once for all," that is, his whole self, his entire 
human nature; ver. 8 — 10. I have only farther to observe, 
that of this kind was the continual sacrifice offered every 
morning and evening, which, it was predicted, the Messiah 
should cause to cease, Dan. ix. 27, and with the abolition of 
which, the Jewish worship and church was brought to a final 
period. 

2dly. The next kind of sacrifices were the DKIDn chattaoth, 
or sin-offerings, the law and rites of which are laid down and 
described in the fourth chapter of Leviticus. The verb Ntorr 
* Outram. de Sacrificiis, lib. i. cap. x. sect. vii. p. 111. 



224 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



chata, in kal, signifies to sin ; and hence D^NDn chattaim sig- 
nifies sinners ; Psalm i. 1. But, in pihel, it has a different sig- 
nification, namely, to cleanse, expiate, make atonement, or 
satisfaction: "That which was torn," saith Jacob to Laban, 
"I brought it not to thee;" monx achattenna, I bore the 
loss of it; I made satisfaction for it; Gen. xxxi. 39. Hence 
the noun iiNtcn chattaah, is used to denote an offering for 
sin, whereby pardon is procured, atonement is made, and sin 
is expiated. In the same sense the apostle Paul uses the 
Greek word dpapna, in imitation, I suppose, of the Hebrew 
phraseology, " Him that knew no sin, v-rrep' /^wv d/mapTiav 
twoiriazv, he hath made a sin-offering for us;" 2 Cor. v. 21. 
And so the apostle renders the following words of the Psalm- 
ist, nWDm nhty gnolah vachattaah, Psalm xl. 6, f OXoKavrM^ara 
Km TTtpi dpapTiag, " burnt-offerings, and sin-offerings;" Heb. x. 
6. Thus iTBpi dpapnag ought undoubtedly to be rendered, 
where it is said, "God sending his Son in the likeness of sin- 
ful flesh, Km irtpi apapnaq, and, by a sin-offering, condemned 
sin in the flesh ;" Rom. viii. 3. 

According to the Scripture account, these sacrifices were 
offered, 

1st. For all sins of ignorance or inadvertency against what 
are commonly called the negative precepts, or with respect to 
things forbidden. The case stated in Leviticus is, "If a 
soul shall sin, through ignorance, against any of the command- 
ments of the Lord, concerning things which ought not to be 
done, and shall do against any of them." Notwithstanding 
this general mode of expression, the rabbies limit the law to 
those sins of ignorance, which, if they had been committed 
knowingly and wilfully, would have incurred the penalty of 
*' cutting off ;" and they tell us they were forty-three in num- 
ber, which they pretend exactly to enumerate. # But the 
words are express against this rabbinical restriction, "If a 
soul shall sin through ignorance, m&D b*QD miccol mitsoth, 
against any of the commandments of the Lord ;" Lev. iv. 2, 
3. 13, 14. 22, 23. 27, 28. Besides, we find these sacrifices 
enjoined in cases where the penalty of being "cut off" could 
not be incurred ; particularly, 

* Maimon, de Sacrifices, tractat.iv. cap. i. sect. ii. — iv. Du Viel, Lond. 
1683. 



( HAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



225 



2dly. On occasion of legal pollution; as at the cleansing of 
a leper, Lev. xiv. 19, and the purification of a woman after 
child-bearing, chap. xii. 6, and other legal pollutions, speci- 
fied in the fifteenth chapter of Leviticus, ver. 19. 29, 30. 

In the common sin-offering, whether private or public, the 
fat only was burnt upon the altar, and part of the blood put 
on the horns of the altar, and part of it poured at the foot of it ; 
chap. iv. 25, 26. But the flesh was the due of the priest, to be 
eaten in the courts of the tabernacle of the congregation, chap, 
vi. 25,26; and by these, and by the trespass-offerings, were 
the priests chiefly maintained in the weeks of their attendance 
on the temple service. Besides many particular occasions, on 
which these sacrifices were offered, there were also constant 
sin-offerings at stated seasons, as on every new moon a kid of 
the goats, Numb, xxviii. 15 ; and on the fifteenth day of the 
passover month, one goat, and so for seven days successively, 
ver. 22. 24; on the day of the feasts of trumpets, a kid, chap, 
xxix. 5; and at the feast of tabernacles, a kid for seven days 
together, ver. 7. 11, et seq. 

There were also sin-offerings of a more solemn nature, 
offered on extraordinary occasions, of which the priests had 
no part, but they were entirely consumed with fire ; not, how- 
ever, on the altar, as the holocausts were, but without the 
camp, or upon the ground in the open field ; only the kidneys 
and the fat were burnt on the altar of burnt-offering, and part 
of the blood poured out at its foot ; and part of it the priest 
carried into the sanctuary, with some of which he tinged the 
horns of the golden altar of sweet incense, and with the rest 
he sprinkled seven times before the Lord, before the veil of 
the sanctuary; Lev. iv. 4. 6—10. 17—19. 21. Of this 
sort was the high-priest's sin-offering bullock, when he had 
sinned through ignorance, " according to the sin of the people ;" 
ver. 2, 3. The sacredness of his office was an aggravation 
of his sin beyond that of others, and his dignity rendered his 
example in doing evil more hurtful than theirs, for which rea- 
son a more solemn sacrifice was appointed to be offered for 
his sins, even of ignorance, than for those of the common peo- 
ple. Of this kind, also, was the high-priest's sin-offering bul- 
lock on the day of expiation, chap xvi. 6 ; only with this dif- 
ference, that the blood of it was sprinkled, not before the veil 

Q 



226 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK i 



of the sanctuary, but before the mercy-seat, in the holy of 
holies; ver. 14. 

Of this sort likewise was the sin-offering bullock for the 
sins through ignorance of the whole congregation, chap. iv. 13. 

The Jewish writers are of different opinions concerning the 
occasion of these sacrifices. Some by the whole congrega- 
tion understand the Sanhedrim, and imagine their sin to be, 
that they had mistaken in judgment, and by that means misled 
the people.* Others interpret it of any general popular de- 
fection from the law of God, which through their ignorance of 
the law was not presently attended to.f Thus when Heze- 
kiah restored the true worship. of God, after the temple had 
been shut up and the daily sacrifices omitted for a considera- 
ble time, he offered " a sin-offering for the kingdom, and for 
the sanctuary, and for Judah;" 2 Chron. xxix. 21. The sa- 
crifice of Christ, which he offered for the sins of his people, is 
resembled in Scripture to the sin-offering of the congregation, 
because he offered it for all of them in the general, as when 
he is said to be u made sin," that is, a sin-offering, {< for us ;" 
2 Cor. v. 21. And his sacrifice is represented to be of the 
same kind with those whose blood was brought within the 
sanctuary for sin, and whose bodies were burnt without the 
camp : " The bodies of those beasts," saith the apostle to the 
Hebrews, " whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the 
high-priest for sin, are burnt without the camp. Wherefore 
Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own 
blood, suffered without the gate;" Heb. xiii. 11, 12, com- 
pared with Lev. xvi. 27. The burning of those sacrifices 
without the camp is to be understood therefore as typical, not 
only of Christ's suffering without the gates of Jerusalem, as 
the apostle applies it ; but, probably, likewise of his suffering 
for the salvation of Gentiles, who were without the camp of 
Israel, as well as Jews ; and the bringing the blood of those 
sacrifices into the holy , place was a figure of Christ's present- 
ing the merits of his death for us, in his heavenly inter- 
cession. 

* Maimonides, and the rabbies in general. Vid. Outram de Sacrificiis, 
lib. i. cap. xiv. sect. i. p. 149, 150, and Hottinger de Juris Hebraeor. 
Leg. cxviii. p. 147, 148, edit. Tigur. 1655. 

t Aben-Ezra. Vid. Outram, sect. i. ad finem, et sect. ii. p. 150—152. 



(HAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



22? 



The third kind of sacrifices were called asha- 
mim, which we render trespass-offerings.* They so greatly 
resembled the sin-offerings, that it is not easy to distinguish 
between them. The occasions on which they were offered 
were much the same ; nay, sometimes the same oblations are 
indifferently called sin-offerings or trespass-offerings, particu- 
larly in the following passage : " And he shall bring his tres- 
pass-offering, ID'^N askamo, unto the Lord, for his sin which 
he hath sinned, Nion mxtDn by gnal chattatho asher 

chata ; and if he be not able to bring a lamb, then he shall 
bring for his trespass which he hath committed, Nton htfjR IDitfN 
ashamo asher chata, two turtle-doves, or two young pigeons, 
the one for a sin-offering, nNtDIT? lechattath, and the other 
for a burnt-offering ;" Lev. v. 6 — 8. Where it is remarkable, 
that the offence committed is called indifferently a sin and a 
trespass ; and the sacrifice offered, a trespass-offering and a 
sin-offering. Nevertheless, there are some circumstances in 
which these two kinds of sacrifices are observed to differ. 
Sin-offerings were sometimes offered for the whole congrega- 
tion ; trespass-offerings never, but for particular persons. Bul- 
locks were sometimes used for sin-offerings, never for trespass- 
offerings. The blood of the sin-offerings was put on the horns of 
the altar, that of the trespass-offerings was only sprinkled round 
about the bottom of the altar : whence some have concluded, 
the difference between the sin-offerings and the trespass-offer- 
ings lay only in these circumstances. But others conceive 
there must have been some greater difference between them, 
which was the reason of their being offered with these different 
circumstances. Yet what that difference was, is variously 
conjectured by many learned men, rather than asserted by 
any. Dr. Lightfoot, from the rabbies,t makes the differ- 
ence to lie in this, that both indeed were offered for the 
same sort of transgressions, but the DitfN asham, or trespass- 
offering, was to be offered, when it was doubtful whether a 
person had transgressed or not. As, suppose he had eat 
some fat, and was afterward in doubt, whether it was the fat 
that belonged to the muscular flesh, which was lawful to be 

* Seethe laws concerning them, Lev. v. and vi. and xiv. 12, 13, and 
xix. 20 — 22, and Numb. vi. 12. 

f See, in particular, R. Abarbanel, Exord. Comment, in Levit. p. 307. 

Q 2 



228 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



eaten ; or the fat of the inwards, which was unlawful ; then 
he was to offer an Dt2JN asham. But if it were certain, and 
he knew that he had trespassed, he must offer the HKlcn chat- 
taah, or sin-offering.* Maimonides is of opinion, that the 
offences for which the DWX asham was offered, were inferior 
to those for which the HNDn chattaah was offered .f Bo- 
chart, on the contrary, is of opinion, that the offences expiated 
by DItfN asham, were more grievous than those expiated 
by rtNDn chattaah.% Aben-Ezra makes rtNDn chattaah to 
signify a sacrifice offered for purging offences committed 
through ignorance of the law ; asham for such as were 
committed through forgetfulness of it.§ Others, again, make 
the difference to be, that the HNIDn chattaah was for offences 
proved by witnesses ; the Dii'N asham for secret faults, known 
to others only by the offender's confession. For it is said, 
" If his sin which he hath sinned, l^N jmn hodhang elaiv, 
come to his knowledge, then he shall bring his offering;" 
Lev. iv. 28. Now jmn hodhang is of a passive signification, 
and here therefore imports, if his fault be made known to him, 
by some other person, then he must offer a sin-offering; 
ver. 29. But elsewhere it is said, (i When a person has been 
guilty of any of the things before mentioned, he shall confess 
that he hath sinned in that thing, and he shall bring his tres- 
pass-offering ;" Lev. v. 5, 6. And, to mention only one 
opinion more, others think the rtNlDn chattaah had respect 
chiefly to offences against God ; and DWH asham, chiefly to of- 
fences against men. To this purpose Dr. Outram observes, 
that in all cases where the DttfN asham is required, there was 
some wrong or injury done him, except in the case of the 
Nazarite defiled by the dead, Numb. vi. 12, and of the 
leper, Lev. xiv. 12. But as both these w T ere to be purged 
with a chattaah as well as an asham, he apprehends they 
afford no material objection to this general rule.|| 

The fourth sort of sacrifices w T ere DM^ttf shelamim, or 

* Lightfoot's Temple Service, chap. viii. 

f More Nevochim, part iii. cap. xlvi. p. 486, edit, et vers. Buxtorf. 
Basil. 1629. 

% Hieroz. part. i. lib. ii. cap. xxxiii. 

§ Aben-Ezra ad Lev. quoted by Outram, de Sacrifices, p. 144. 
|| Outram de Sacrinciis, lib. i. cap. xiii. per totum, p. 135 — 147, especi- 
ally sect. viii. p; 143—145. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



229 



peace-offerings ; so called, not as being intended to make 
peace with God, but rather to preserve it. Burnt-offerings, 
sin-offerings, and trespass-offerings, were all offered under the 
notion of some offence committed, and some guilt contracted, 
which they were the means of removing ; but in the peace- 
offerings the offerer was supposed to be at peace with God, 
and the offering was made rather in a way of thankful acknow- 
ledgment for mercies received, or as accompanying vows for 
the obtaining of farther blessings ; or, in a way of free devo- 
tion, as a means of preserving and continuing peace with 
God. Thus the peace-offerings are distinguished into sa- 
crifices of thanksgiving, votive-offerings, and voluntary or 
free-will offerings; Lev. vii. 11, 12. 16. The sacrifice of 
thanksgiving, which the Septuagint renders Ovma njc aivzaeojg, 
is evidently referred to in these words of the Epistle to the 
Hebrews : " By him let us offer the sacrifice of praise to 
God;" Heb. xiii. 15. Some peace-offerings were required, 
by the law, to be offered at certain times, and on particular 
occasions ; as on the feast of Pentecost, Lev. xxiii. 19; by a 
Nazarite, when he had accomplished his vow, Numb. vi. 14; 
and at the consecration of the priest; Exod. xxix. 28. But 
generally it was referred to the devotion and free-will of the 
people, to offer these sacrifices when and how often they 
pleased. 

The peace-offerings might be either of the flock or the 
herd, Lev. iii. 1. 6; that is, either of beeves, or sheep, or 
goats, and either male or female. 

But birds were not allowed, the reason of which was, pro- 
bably, because they were too small to admit of being divided 
into three parts : one for the altar, another for the priests, and 
a third for the offerer, without bringing the sacrifice into 
contempt. 

In all peace-offerings, the fat, that is, the suet, as also the 
kidneys, were burnt upon the altar, Lev. iii. 3 — 5 ; and if the 
sacrifice was of the flock, that is, a sheep or a goat, the rump 
or tail was burnt along with them, ver. 9 — 11. 

The breast and the right shoulder were the priest's due, 
and they are called the wave-breast and the heave-shoulder, 
Lev. vii. 34, because of the ceremony of waving them this 
way and that, and upward and downward, which was done by 



230 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



the owner of the sacrifice, as the form of his presenting them 
to God. These portions of the peace-offerings were allotted 
toward the maintenance of the priests, during the weeks of 
their attendance at the sanctuary ; for they were not per- 
mitted to carry them home with them unto their own houses 
in the country; but they and their families were to "eat 
them in the place which the Lord should choose;" that is, the 
place of his public most solemn worship by sacrifice; Deut. 
xii. 18. 

Along with these peace-offerings, at least with those of 
thanksgiving, there was also offered bread of fine flour, and 
oil, both leavened and unleavened, made into cakes and 
wafers, which were likewise the priest's due ; Lev. vii. 12, 13. 
The rest of the flesh of the peace-offerings belonged to the 
owner of the sacrifice, with which it was usual to make a 
feast, and entertain his friends, either on the day of the sa- 
crifice, or the next day at farthest; for if any of the flesh re- 
mained till the third day, it was to be burnt; ver 17. Thus 
the lewd woman in the Proverbs is represented as inviting an 
unwary youth to a feast upon her votive peace-offerings ; 
Prov. vii. 14. These feasts were often kept in the courts of 
the temple, or in some of the buildings adjoining, where there 
were cook-rooms, and conveniences for dressing the flesh of 
the sacrifices, as appears very probable from the account of 
the solemn Passover which Josiah kept at the temple, that the 
Levites "roasted the Passover with fire, according to the 
ordinance : but the other holy offerings sod they in pots, and 
in caldrons, and in pans, and divided them speedily among 
all the people. And afterward they made ready for them- 
selves and for the priests;" 2 Chron. xxxv. 13, 14. In like 
manner they did at Shiloh, before the temple was built ; where 
the sons of Eli, instead of contenting themselves with the 
breast and shoulder, which the law assigned them for their 
due, brought up a custom of sticking a three-pronged fork or 
hook into the caldron where the peace-offering was boiling, 
and taking whatever it brought up ; 1 Sam. ii. 13, 14. 

The Gentiles, likewise, who borrowed many of their sacri- 
ficial rites from the Jews, used sometimes to hold the feasts of 
their peace T offerings in the temples of their gods. Hence 
St, Paul, in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, speaks of their 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



231 



" sitting at meat in the idol's temple;" 1 Cor. viii. 10. But 
they did not always feast upon this flesh with their friends ; 
they sometimes sold it in the common market, as is plainly 
intimated in the following passage of the same epistle, " What- 
ever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question for 
conscience' sake," 1 Cor. x. 25, that is, as the context leads 
us to understand it, not inquiring whether it had been offered 
in sacrifice to an idol. 

Thus much for the different sorts of sacrifices, in respect to 
their signification and use. 

2dly. Sacrifices may be divided, in respect to the persons 
that offered them, into public and private. 

1st. The public sacrifices*were offered for the whole people 
of Israel ; as two lambs for burnt-offerings every day, one in 
the morning, the other in the evening; which are called the 
continual burnt-offering, Exod. xxix. 42; two lambs more, 
that is, four, on every sabbath-day, Numb, xxviii. 9, 10; two 
young bullocks, one ram, and seven lambs, for a burnt-offer- 
ing, and a kid of the goats for a sin-offering, every new 
moon, ver. 11. 15; and the same sacrifices every day of the 
feast of unleavened bread, and of the first-fruits, ver. 17, et 
seq. On the day of the feast of trumpets, on the great day 
of expiation, and at the feast of tabernacles, there were also 
extraordinary public sacrifices appointed; Numb. xxix. Be- 
side these and some other stated public sacrifices, there were 
occasional public sacrifices sometimes offered; as the sin-of- 
fering of the congregation, when they had sinned through 
ignorance; Lev. iv. 13, 14. And on occasion of the war with 
the Benjamites, " all the children of Israel offered burnt-offer- 
ings and peace-offerings before the Lord;" Judges xx. 26. 

2dly. Private sacrifices, offered for particular persons, were 
either stated or occasional. Of the former sort was the 
paschal lamb, sacrificed annually for each family; and the 
high-priest's sin-offering for himself, on the day of expiation; 
Lev. xvi. 6. To this there is a reference in the following 
passage of the apostle: " Into the second" tabernacle, or holy 
of holies, " went the high-priest alone every year, not without 
blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the 
people ;" Heb. ix. 7. 

Occasional private sacrifices were offered on account of any 



232 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



trespass committed against the law, or any legal pollution 
contracted, any vow made, any blessing received, &c. 

3dly. Sacrifices are again to be distinguished, in respect to 
the subject-matter of them, into bloody or unbloody, or into 
animal and vegetable. 

The animal sacrifices were of one species of the herd; 
namely, the bullock, or cow, including the calf : two of the 
flock ; namely, sheep and goats : and two of the fowls ; 
namely, doves and pigeons. 

The unbloody, or vegetable sacrifices, of which we are to 
speak at present, were the mn:D minchoth, and DOD: nesachim, 
meat-offerings and drink-offerings. As for the tithes and first- 
fruits, we shall have occasion to speak of them hereafter. 

The meat-offerings were either attended with drink-offer- 
ings, or they were offered alone. 

1st. The meat-offerings, attended with drink-offerings, 
called D*OD3 mnaD minchoth nesachim, were fine flour, salt, 
and oil, made either into thick cakes, or thin wafers, and 
baked either in a pan or oven. The drink-offering was of 
wine, which was poured out at the base of the altar. These 
meat and drink-offerings were a sort of appendages to the 
sacrifices ; they were offered along with all the burnt-offerings, 
except of birds, and with the peace-offerings, Numb. xv. 3, 
&c; but not with the sin-offerings, except that which was 
offered at the cleansing a leper; Lev. xiv. 10. 

2dly. The meat-offerings alone, which were not offered 
along with animal sacrifices, were either public or private. 

The public were the wave sheaf, Lev. xxiii. 10, 11, and the 
twelve cakes of shew bread; Lev. xxiv. 5. 

The private were either enjoined by the law, as that of the 
priest at his consecration, Lev. vi. 20, and that which the 
jealous husband was to offer, Numb. v. 15; or they were 
allowed in case of poverty, when the persons could not afford 
a more costly sacrifice; Lev. v. 11. 

The meat-offerings were all of white flour, except that of 
the jealous husband, which was of barley meal, without any 
mixture; and the wave sheaf, which was not ground into 
flour; all the rest were fine wheat flour, seasoned with salt; 
Lev. ii. 13. Some were mixt with oil, or frankincense, or 
both ; ver. 15. Some were offered unbaked, others baked. 



CHAP. V.] 



SACRIFICES. 



233 



Some were eat by the priests, without bringing them to the 
altar at all; as the leavened cakes and the shew bread. 

Some were wholly consumed on the altar, as every meat- 
offering for a priest; Lev. vi. 23. 

But as to the most of them, a memorial or small part was 
consumed on the altar; the rest belonged to the priest; Lev. 
ii. 2, 3. 

Thus I have given you a brief account of the Jewish sacri- 
fices. I shall only farther observe, that if a person, obliged 
by the law to offer any of these sacrifices, refused to do it, he 
was punished even with " cutting off." But the Jews were 
generally so zealously attached to their law, that there was 
very rarely an occasion for inflicting punishment upon this 
account. If a man, who lived at a great distance from Jeru- 
salem, had fallen under an offence, which required him to 
make a sin or a trespass-offering, the rabbies say, he might 
defer it till the next solemn festival, when all were obliged to 
appear before the Lord at the national altar. # 

* See on this subject Maimonides de Sacrificiis, Abarbanel's Exordium 
Comment, in Levit., and Outram de Sacrificiis. 



CHAPTER VL 



OF THE PROPHETS. 

Concerning the prophets, we shall first consider the 
name, and then the duty and business of the prophetic office. 

As to the name, there are three different words, by which 
prophets are denominated in Scripture ; namely, run n*n 
roeh, chozeh, nabhi, which are all found in one passage, where 
we read of Samuel rw~n haroeh, Nathan N<03n hannabhi, and 
Gad mnn hachozeh; 1 Chron. xxix. 29. The word NOD nabhi, 
is by some derived from «n bo, venit, intimating that God 
came to the prophet by the divine afflatus. Thus Ezekiel 
saith, nn V2 *OJTi vattabo bi ruach, which we render, " and 
the spirit entered into me," Ezek. ii. 2. Some light, perhaps, 
may be hereby given to that remarkable promise of Christ, 
" If any man love me, he will keep my words, and I and my 
Father will love him, and we will come and make our abode 
with him," John xiv. 23 ; namely, by the continual influence 
of the Spirit on his heart. 

But others derive nabhi from 313 nnbh, provenire, 

from whence comes ^ nibh, germen, fructus, a word meta- 
phorically applied to speech, which is called the fruit, 2^3 nibh, 
of the lips, Isa. lvii. 19 ; and it is said the mouth of the just 
bringeth forth y\is janubh, wisdom; Prov. x. 31. Prophecy, 
therefore, being the fruit of the lips in consequence of divine 
inspiration, the prophet is called nabhi. In the first place 
wherein this word occurs, it is applied to Abraham : " Restore 
the man his wife, for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for 
thee, and thou shalt live ; but if thou restore her not, thou 
shalt die Gen. xx. 7. Where a nabhi is supposed to 
be a friend of God, whom he would not suffer to be wronged, 
and whose prayers were very prevalent with him. Accordingly 
by the Psalmist God is represented as saying, " Touch not mine 



CHAP. VI.] 



OP THE PROPHETS. 



235 



anointed, and do my prophets no harm;" Psalm cv. 15. And 
from the following passage of Jeremiah, it appears to have 
been the special business of the D^Kli nebhiim, or prophets, to 
pray for the people : " If they be prophets, and if the word of 
the Lord be with them, let them now make intercession to the 
Lord of hosts," &c; chap, xxvii. 18. And their prayers are 
supposed to be very prevalent with God : " Though Moses and 
Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward 
this people;" chap. xv. 1. When, therefore, God was de- 
termined to bring judgments upon the Israelites, he forbad 
Jeremiah the prophet to pray for them : ft Then said the 
Lord unto me, Pray not for this people for their good;" 
chap. xiv. 11. 

The other two names of a prophet, nm chozeh and nm roeh, 
seem to be synonymous, both signifying, one that seeth or dis- 
cerneth ; the former from ntn chazah, and the latter from 1*1*0 
raah, vidit. And, indeed, it is hard to say, how these three 
names or titles differ in their signification. 

It should seem, the word nm roeh was the more ancient 
denomination of the prophet: but in the days of Samuel the 
word nabhi was grown into more common use; as ap- 

pears from the following passage: " He that is now called a 
prophet, N'Ol nabhi, was beforetime called a seer, n*n roeh ;" 
1 Sam. ix. 9. Here a considerable difficulty ariseth; for we 
do not any where meet with the word nm roeh in the Scrip- 
ture history before this time, whereas the word nabhi is 
common in the writings of Moses; who is therefore by some 
supposed not to have been the author of the Pentateuch, a 
word commonly occurring therein, which it seems was not 
used till long after his days. 

One solution that has been offered is, that the word N*n3 
nabhi, though in common use in the days of Moses, was not 
used in the same sense as nm roeh was in the days of 
Samuel, namely, for a revealer of secrets, or a man by whom 
God was to be consulted ; but that anciently it only signified 
a friend of God, one who had an intimacy with him. But this 
is hardly reconcileable with the character of a i^-U nabhi, or 
prophet, described in several places of the Pentateuch (Numb, 
xii. 6; Deut. xiii. 1; and chap, xviii. 22), as one to whom 
God makes himself known by visions, or dreams, who gives 



236 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book r. 



miraculous signs of his divine mission, and foretells things to 
come. And surely such a one must be as capable of reveal- 
ing secrets as any nxi roeh, or seer, in after-times. 

Others solve the difficulty, by supposing the word n*n roeh 
was anciently in vulgar use, and being esteemed a low word, 
which would have been unsuitable to the purity and dignity 
of Moses's style, he for that reason always uses the politer 
word nabhi; but that in Samuel's time nab/ti was 
also grown into common and vulgar use. No doubt there 
might be words in the Hebrew, as there are in our language, 
which are decently enough used in conversation, but are 
hardly thought proper for the pulpit, or for any grave com- 
positions. Of this sort might have been the word HNI 
roeh ; but as the language grew more refined, it was of course 
dropped, -and the more polite word nabhi substituted in its 
room, both in conversation and in writing. It is observed in 
confirmation of this opinion, that the word HN") roeh is but 
very seldom used in the sacred writings. 

After all, I know not whether two lines of Horace, in his 
Art of Poetry, will not suggest the easiest solution of this 
difficulty : 

Multa renascentur, quse jam cecidere^ cadentque 
Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus. 

L. 70, 71. 

The word Kvn: nabhi might have been common in the days 
of Moses, it might have grown much out of use in some cen- 
turies afterwards, when PIN") roeh was used instead of it; and 
nevertheless, be revived and become common in the days of 
Samuel. 

Thus much for the name; we now come to consider the 
thing, or the duty and business of a prophet. 

A prophet, in the strict and proper sense, was one to whom 
the knowledge of secret things w r as revealed, that he might 
declare them to others,* whether they w r ere things past, or 
present, or to come. The woman of Samaria perceived our 
Saviour was a prophet, by his telling her the secrets of her 
past life; John iv. 19. The prophet Elisha had the present 
conduct of his servant Gehazi revealed to him; 2 Kings v. 26. 

* Maimon. Prsefat. in Mishn. p. 4, edit. Surenhus. Appellabant Prophe- 
tarn, Videntem, quod res futuras, antequam existerent, prsevideret 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



237 



And most of the prophets had revelations concerning future 
events ; above all, concerning the coming and kingdom of the 
Messiah : " He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the 
house of his servant David, as he spake by the mouth of his 
holy prophets, which have been since the world began Luke 
i. 69, 70. # Nevertheless, in a more lax or analogical sense, 
the title prophet is sometimes given to persons who had no 
such revelation, nor were properly inspired. Thus Aaron is 
said to be Moses's prophet : " The Lord said unto Moses,' 
See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh, and Aaron thy 
brother shall be thy prophet," Exod. vii. 1 : because Aaron 
received the divine messages, which he carried to Pharaoh 
immediately from Moses ; whereas other prophets receive their 
messages immediately from God himself. In this respect, as 
Moses stood in the place of God to Pharaoh, so Aaron acted 
in the character of his prophet. 

The title of prophets is given also to the sacred musicians, 
who sung the praises of God, or who accompanied the song 
with musical instruments. Thus " the sons of Asaph, and of 
Heman, and of Jeduthun," are said to " prophesy with harps, 
with psalteries, and with cymbals," 1 Chron. xxv. 1 ; and they 
prophesied, it is said, " according to the order of the king;" 
ver. 2. Upon which R. S. Jarchi remarks, they prophesied 
when they played upon these musical instruments. We also 
read in the story of Saul's advancement to the kingdom of 
Israel, that he met " a company of prophets coming down 
from the high place with a psaltery and a tabor, and a pipe, 
and a harp before them; and they prophesied, and he with 
them;" 1 Sam. x. 5. 10. What kind of prophecy this was is 
evident; it was praising God with spiritual songs, and the 
melody of musical instruments. Perhaps Miriam, the sister 
of Aaron, may be called a prophetess only on this account, 
that she led the concert of the women, who sung the song 
of Moses with timbrels and with dances; Exod. xv. 20, 21. 
Thus the heathen poets, who sung or composed verses in 
praise of their gods, were called by the Romans vates, or 
prophets ; which is of the same import with the Greek irpo^>r\Tr]g, 

* The rabbies say, all the prophets prophesied concerning the Messiah. 
Vid. Cod. Sanhedrin, cap. xi. sect, xxxvii. p. 362; Cocceii excerpt. Gemar. 



238 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



a title which St. Paul gives to Epimenides, a Cretan poet; 
Tit. i. 12. 

This notion of prophets and prophesying may give some 
light to the following passage in the First Epistle to the 
Corinthians, chap. xi. 5 : " Every woman, praying or pro- 
phesying with her head uncovered, dishonoureth her head." 
Prophesying cannot be understood in the stricter sense of 
foretelling things to come, nor even of interpreting the holy 
Scriptures by divine inspiration; in which sense the word 
seems to be used, when the apostle, discoursing of spiritual 
gifts, prefers the gift of prophecy above all others, because, 
saith he, " he that prophesieth speaketh unto men for edifica- 
tion, and exhortation, and comfort;" 1 Cor. xiv. 3. However, 
neither of these kinds of prophesying will suit with the design 
of the apostle, when, in the passage we are now considering ;, 
he speaks of a woman's prophesying in the church or congre- 
gation; for there she was not permitted to speak, nor so much 
as to ask a question for her instruction, much less to teach 
and instruct others; ver. 34. In order to solve the difficulty, 
some would have the word irpo^-nTEvovcra to be taken passively, 
and to signify, a hearing or being present at prophesying : but 
this is an acceptation of the term contrary to the rules of 
grammar, and without example either in Scripture or in any 
profane author. Besides, though she may properly enough 
be said to pray, as joining with the minister, who is the mouth 
of the congregation to God ; yet with no propriety can she 
be said to prophesy, only as attending on the preaching of the 
minister, who is considered as the mouth of God to the con- 
gregation. 

Perhaps, then, prophesying may here mean (as we have 
shown it does mean in other places) praising God in psalms 
and hymns. And thus praying and prophesying are fitly 
joined together, these being the tw T o parts of public worship, 
in which the whole congregation is supposed to unite.* 

* Vid. Mede's Diatrib. disc. xvi. on 1 Cor. xi. 5, p. 58, et seq. of his 
Works. Smith, in his Discourse on Prophecy, apprehends that singing was 
called prophecy, when the songs or psalms were composed under the in- 
fluence of the Divine Spirit, to the sound of musical instruments. Perhaps 
some of the prophets having uttered such inspired compositions to music, 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF 



THE PROPHETS. 



239 



We have observed, that a prophet, in the strict and proper 
sense, was one, to whom the knowledge of secret things was 
revealed, in order that he might declare them to others. Of 
such prophets the talmudists reckon forty-eight from Abraham 
to Malachi, and seven prophetesses.* It is remarkable, that 
though, to make up their catalogue, they take in Eldad and 
Medad, mentioned in the book of Numbers, chap. xi. 26 ; 
concerning whom, however, it does not appear that they re- 
vealed any secret ; but their prophesying was no more than 
exhorting the people to obedience to God, to which they were 
moved, and in which they were assisted by the Holy Spirit, 
as were the rest of the seventy elders, ver. 25; notwithstand- 
ing this, I say, they do not admit Daniel into the list/t* nor 
place his writings among those of the prophets, but only among 
the hagiographa;^: which they reckon of the least authority 
of all the canonical books. The reasons they assign for it, as 
they are recited by the authors of the Ancient Universal His- 
tory,§ are, 

1st. That Daniel was a courtier, and spent his life in luxury 
and grandeur, in the service of an uncircumcised king. 

2dly. That the spirit of prophecy was confined to the land 
of Canaan, out of which he lived all his life. And some have 
added a 

3d reason ; namely, that he was made a eunuch, according 
to Isaiah's prophecy, which he delivered to Hezekiah, 2 Kings 
xx. 18; and such were excluded from entering into the con- 
gregation of the Lord : though Aben-Ezra vindicates him from 
this imputation. || 

might give occasion to the more general application of the term to all who 
sung divine hymns, accompanied with instrumental music. See Smith's 
Select Discourses, p. 230. 232. 

* Vid. Megill. fol. xiv. i. et R.S. Jarchi ad loc. ; vid. etiam notam Vorstii 
ad p. 124 ; Maimon. tract, de Fundament. Legis. edit. Amstel. 1680. 

f Vid. Cocceii excerpt. Gemar. Cod. Sanhedr. cap. xi. sect. xvi. p. 324, 
edit. Amstel. 1629. Hi (nempe Haggaeus, Zacharias, et Malachias) preesta- 
bant ipsi, qui essent prophetae, quum Daniel non merit propheta. Ipse illis 
major ob visam visionem. 

X Maimon. More Nevoch. part ii. cap. xlv. p. 318, 319, edit. Buxtorf. 
Basil. 1629. 

§ Hist, of the Jews, book i. chap. vii. sect. iii. sub fin, note. 
|| Aben-Ezra in Daniel. 



240 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



R. Johanan is represented in the Gemara as casting a still 
more injurious reflection on him ; namely, that he stole into 
Egypt to buy hogs, at the time Nebuchadnezzar set up his 
golden image, and his three friends, Shadrach, Meshech, and 
Abednego, were thrown into the fiery furnace for refusing to 
worship it. # 

After all, it is easy to discern what was the true cause of 
the rancour which many of the rabbies have discovered against 
this eminent prophet : it is because he has so clearly predicted 
and ascertained the time of the Messiah's coming, which is 
long since elapsed ; and because of the great advantage which 
the Christians have hereby obtained in their arguments against 
the Jews. Therefore, I say, though their historian Josephus 
was so far from denying him the title of a prophet, that he has 
in several respects given him the preference to the rest of the 
prophets ;f and notwithstanding the high character that is 
given of him in the prophecy of Ezekiel, chap. xiv. 14, 
wherein he is ranked with Noah and Job, men of eminent 
righteousness and piety ; nevertheless, several of the rabbies, 
though not all,J have spitefully endeavoured to sink his cha- 
racter below that of a prophet, or even of a good man. 

Malachi has been commonly reckoned by the Christians 
the last prophet § under the Old Testament dispensation, with 
whom the spirit of prophecy ceased four hundred eighty-six 
years before Christ. Nevertheless Josephus mentions several 
others, who during those ages predicted various future events 
by the spirit of prophecy ; as one Judas an Essene,|| Sameas,^[ 
Mahanem ; ## and Hircanus the high-priest, the fourth of the 
Asmonean princes from Judas Maccabeus, is said by Josephus 

* Vid. Cod. Sanhedrin, cap. xi.-sect. xiii. apud Cocceii excerpt. Gemar. 
p. 320, edit. Amstel. 1629. 

- t Antiq. lib. x. cap. xi. sect. vii. p. 543, edit. Haverc. 

I Vid. Hottinger. Thesaur. Philolog. lib. ii. cap. i. sect. iii. p. 511, edit. 
Tigur. 1649. 

§ So saith the Talmud likewise. Vid. Cocceii excerpt. Gemar. Sanhedr. 
cap. i. sect. xiii. p. 156. Tradunt Magistri, ex quo mortui sunt prophetae 
posteriores, Haggaeus, Zacharias, Malachias, ablatus est Spiritus Sanctus ab 
Israele. 

|| Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. xi. sect. ii. p. 665, edit. Haverc. lovdav riva Eavtjvov 
fiev ro ytvog, ovdtiroTE Se tv oig ttoouttb dia-^evffafievov raXrjOtg. 

% Lib. xv. cap. i. sect. i. p. 740. ** Ibid. cap. x. sect. v. p. 777. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



241 



to be honoured with three of the highest dignities, being a 
prophet, as well as prince and high-priest. In his Antiquities 
he gives two instances of his prophetic gift. # However that 
be, we have good authority to add John the Baptist to the 
list of prophets under the Old Testament, though his history 
is recorded in the New ; for he lived and prophesied before 
the kingdom of God, or the Messiah's kingdom, was set up. 
Accordingly our Saviour distinguishes the time in which John 
the Baptist lived, from the time of the kingdom of God, or 
the gospel dispensation. " Among those that are born of 
women, there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist, 
but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he," 
Luke vii. 28 ; that is, on account of the clearness of the gos- 
pel revelation, by means of which, ordinary Christians may 
know more of the glories of divine grace, than any of the 
Old Testament prophets, or even John himself knew. 

On the same account we may add to the list of the Old 
Testament prophets, Zachariah, the father of John, " who was 
filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied," Luke i. 67 ; and 
likewise Simeon, and Anna the prophetess ; chap. ii. 25. 36. 
Indeed, some of the Jewish rabbies will not allow that the 
spirit of prophecy ever quite departed from them ; but they 
tell us of a certain $adovx,ia, or torch of prophecy, one shining 
when another was set. R. Kimchi gives us this mystical gloss 
upon the following passage in the First Book of Samuel : "And 
it came to pass at that time, when Eli was laid down in his 
place, and his eyes began to wax dim, that he could not see, 
and ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the Lord, 
where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to 
sleep, that the Lord called Samuel," chap. iii. 2 — 4 ; — I say, 
R. Kimchi, glossing on these words, saith, " This is spoken 
mystically concerning the spirit of prophecy ; according to the 
saying among our doctors, The sun riseth, and the sun 
setteth ; that is, ere God makes the sun of one righteous 
man to set, he makes the sun of another righteous man to 
rise." 

But, leaving the Jewish whims and fables concerning the 
number of their prophets, we proceed to inquire concerning 

* Lib. xiii. cap. x. sect. iii. p. 662 ; and cap. xii. sect. i. p. 066. 
R 



242 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



{BOOK 1 4 



the manner in which the revelation was made, both by God 
to the prophets, and by them to the people. 

However, before we directly consider the manner in which 
God revealed secrets to the prophets, it will be proper to 
premise a few words concerning the qualifications of a pro- 
phet, or the pre-requisites to a man's receiving the spirit of 
prophecy. 

The first and most essential qualification of a prophet was 
true piety. This is the constant sense and opinion of the 
Jewish doctors. # To which agree those words of St. Peter, 
" Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost;" 2 Pet. i. 21. Yet this general rule is not without 
exceptions ; for God, on special occasions and for particular 
purposes, sometimes vouchsafed the prophetic spirit to bad 
men ; as to Balaam, " who loved the wages of unrighteous- 
ness." However, it may well be supposed, that none but 
good men were stated prophets, so as to be frequently fa- 
voured with the divine afflatus ; and especially, that none but 
such were honoured with being employed as the writers of 
any part of the canon of Scripture ; insomuch, that the as- 
sertion of St. Peter concerning the written prophecies of the 
Old Testament, is true without exception. 

We may, perhaps, reasonably account for the ceasing of the 
spirit of prophecy from among the Jews in the latter ages of 
their polity, till it was revived at the coming of our Saviour, 
from their universal degeneracy and corruption in religion 
and morals. 

2dly. The mind of the prophet must be in a proper posture 
and fram^ for receiving the divine afflatus, or prophetic spirit ; 
that is, say the doctors, it must not be oppressed with grief, 
or disturbed with passion of any kind. Their tradition says, 
that Jacob did not prophecy all the time of his grief for the 
loss of Joseph ; nor Moses for a long time after the return of 
the spies, who brought an evil report of the land of Canaan, 
because of his indignation against them .f And by the holy 
spirit, which David prays might not be taken away, but re- 
stored to him, Psalm li. 10, 11, the Chaldee Paraphrast, and 
the Hebrew commentators, understand the spirit of prophecy, 

* Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part ii. cap. xxxii. p. 284. 
t Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. cap. xxxvi. p. 295, 296. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



243 



which, they say, was withdrawn on account of his sorrow and 
grief for his shameful miscarriage in the matter of Uriah. 
And when he prays, that God would - • make him to hear joy 
and gladness," ver. 8, they understand it of a cheerful frame 
of mind, which would fit him for receiving the prophetic af- 
flatus ; and " the free spirit, with which he prays he might 
be upheld," ver. 12, they interpret of a spirit of alacrity and 
liberty of mind, free from the oppression of grief, or discom- 
posure of passion. 

In order to prove, that passion disqualified a man for re- 
ceiving the prophetic afflatus, they allege the story of Elisha, 
in the third chapter of the Second Book of Kings : when the 
kings of Judah, and Israel, and Edom, in their distress for 
water during an expedition against Moab, came to Elisha, to 
inquire of God by him, the prophet seems to have been moved 
with indignation against the wicked king of Israel, addressing 
him in the following manner: "What have I to do with thee ? 
Get thee to the prophets of thy father, and to the prophets of 
thy mother ; surely if it were not that I regard the presence 
of Jehosaphat, the king of Judah, I would not look upon thee, 
nor see thee 2 Kings iii. 12, 13. However, being willing 
to oblige Jehosaphat, /' he called for a minstrel ; and it came 
to pass when the minstrel played, that the hand of the Lord 
came upon him;" ver. 15. The use of the minstrel seems to 
be to calm his passion and compose his mind, that he might 
be fit to receive the divine afflatus. 

This may perhaps suggest to us one reason, why the pro- 
phets practised music, see 1 Sam. x. 5; namely, because of 
its tendency to compose their minds, and to free them from 
all such melancholy or angry passions, as would render them 
unfit for the spirit of prophecy. We find this remedy suc- 
cessfully applied to Saul's melancholy: "And it came to pass, 
when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took 
an harp and played with his hand ; so Saul was refreshed and 
was well, and the evil spirit departed from him;" 1 Sam. xvi. 
23. This evil spirit was perhaps originally nothing but me- 
lancholy, or grief and anguish, which, however, through 
divine permission, was wrought upon and heightened by the 
insinuations of some evil spirit, which, at times, it seems, 
instigated him to prophesy : " It came to pass on the morrow, 

r 2 



244 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



that the evil spirit came upon him, and he prophesied in the 
midst of the house," 1 Sam. xviii. 10 ; which the Targum of 
Jonathan renders " insanivit in medio domus and Rabbi 
Levi Ben Gershon glosses upon it thus : " He spake in the 
midst of the house very confusedly, by reason of the evil 
spirit." But why this should be called prophesying is not 
easy to determine, unless he sometimes sung in his raving 
fits, since singing is called prophesying, as we have already 
shown. Mr. Henry supposes, Saul pretended a religious 
ecstasy, imitating the motions and gestures of a prophet, 
with a design to decoy David into a snare, and put him off 
from his guard, and perhaps, if he could kill him, to impute 
it to a divine impulse. However that was, Saul's original 
disorder was probably melancholy, for which music was a 
proper remedy. And so it is often still found to be ; par- 
ticularly for the deep melancholy occasioned by the bite of a 
tarantula, which is ordinarily cured by this means. You may 
see a great variety of instances of the powerful effects of music 
in calming the passions of the mind, and in some cases curing 
the disorders of the body, produced by Bochart in his Hie- 
rozoicon . # 

We come now to consider the manner in which God re- 
vealed secrets to the prophets ; which the apostle saith was 
TroXvTpoTrwQ, " in divers manners," Heb. i. 1, as by dreams, 
visions, inspirations, voices, and angels. 

1st. By dreams and visions. I join these together, since 
they seem to be sometimes used as synonymous terms ; and 
visions import no more than prophetic dreams. Thus Nebu- 
chadnezzar's dream is called the visions of his head ; Dan. ii. 
28. And so is Daniel's dream, chap. vii. 1. This is pro- 
perly what we are to understand by a " vision of the night," 
in the book of Job, chap. xx. 8 ; and God is said to speak 
" in a dream, in a vision of the night chap, xxxiii. 14, 15. 
And in Genesis, God " spake unto Israel in the visions of 
the night ;" chap. xlvi. 2. Nevertheless, in some other places, 
visions seem to be distinguished from dreams \ as in the 
following passage: "Your old men shall dream dreams, and 
your young men shall see visions ;" Joel ii. 28. When a 
vision is distinguished from a dream, I conceive it denotes 
* Part i. lib. ii. cap. xliv. p. 461 — 465, Oper. vol. ii. 1712. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



245 



the representation of things made to the imagination of the 
prophet while he is awake. Perhaps the difference between 
prophetic dreams and visions may be much the same as be- 
tween common dreams and a delirium in a fever ; in which 
the patient, though awake, imagines he sees things and per- 
sons that are not present, and of which therefore his senses 
give him no notice. 

Such was the vision that St. Peter saw in a trance or ecs- 
tasy; Acts xi. 5. For he saw it, not upon his bed in the 
visions of the night, but on the house-top about noon, while 
he was at prayer ; chap. x. 9, 10. Such perhaps was Paul's 
vision of the third heavens, 2 Cor. xii. 1, 2. 4; though whe- 
ther this was not more than a vision, Paul himself could not 
inform us : " Whether in the body, I cannot tell ; or out of 
the body, I cannot tell; God knoweth." That is, whether 
celestial objects were represented to him in a vision only; or 
whether his soul was really for a time separated from his body, 
and translated into the heavenly regions. However, by the 
way, we may surely conclude, from St. Paul's uncertainty on 
this head, that the soul is something quite distinct from the 
body, which can exist and act, and receive and understand 
celestial things in a state of separation from it ; otherwise the 
soul must have had this vision in the body, or not at all, and 
it could have been no doubt with St. Paul, whether at this 
time he was in the body or out of the body. 

Again, the word vision is applied, not only to such ima- 
ginary representations, but to real miraculous appearances 
made to the senses. Thus the angel's appearing to Zachariah 
in the temple is called a vision ; Luke i. 22. Sometimes the 
word is used in a laxer sense, for any kind of divine revelation ; 
as the voice which the child Samuel heard in the tabernacle, 
is called a vision, though it does not seem to have been ac- 
companied with any sensible appearance; 1 Sam. iii. 15. 
The books of the prophecies of Isaiah, Obadiah, and Nahum, 
are expressly called their visions ; though it does not seem 
probable, that all the revelations contained in them, were 
conveyed to the prophets by visionary representations. 

It has been inquired, how the prophets could certainly dis- 
tinguish these prophetic dreams and visions from common 
dreams, and from enthusiastical and diabolical delusions ; for 



246 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



which purposes several criteria have been assigned by Jewish 
and Christian writers ; for instance, 

1st. Divine dreams and visions are said to have been known 
by the extraordinary majesty and splendour of the appear- 
ance, or the strength and vigour of the representation made 
to the prophet, and the liveliness of his perception of it ; see 
Dan. vii. 8; viii. 27 ; x. 8 ; which, sometimes, was such as 
the feeble powers of nature could hardly sustain . # 

2dly. During the divine ecstasy, the prophet had the full 
exercise of his reason ;f whereas diabolical possessions and 
inspirations threw him into a fit of madness. So Virgil de- 
scribes the Sybil, when the prophetic afflatus came upon her, 
as perfectly distracted and raving. 

Subito non vultus, non color unus, 

Non comptae mansere comae : sed pectus anhelans, 
Et rabie fera corda tument ; majorque videri, 
Nec mortale sonans : Amata est Numine quando 
Jam propriore Dei. 

iEneid. vi. I, 47, et seq. 

3dly. The subject-matter of divine visions and revelations, 
it is supposed, was always serious, weighty, and important ; 
such as it became the wisdom, and holiness, and majesty of 
God to reveal. 

After all, if we are content without being wise above what 
is written, we must frankly acknowledge, we do not certainly 
know what those criteria w 7 ere. But of this we may be sure, 
and it is sufficient, that God, who has an absolute power over 
the hearts and spirits of men, can give any man certain evi- 
dence and assurance in his own breast, that a revelation, 
which he is pleased to vouchsafe, does indeed come from 
him ; otherwise, God would be supposed to be the most im- 

* Maimon. de Fundament. Legis, cap. vii. sect. iii. p. 92. 103, edit, et 
interpret. Verstii, Amstel. 1680. 

f This is agreeable to the definition which Maimonides gives of pro- 
phecy, that it is an influence of the Deity, first upon the rational, and then 
upon the imaginative faculty, by the mediation of the active intellect. Vid. 
Moreh Nevoch. partii. cap. xxxvi. p. 292 ; compare cap. xxxviii., especially 
p. 300. De veris prophetis tantum loquutus sum, ut nempe excipiam eos, 
— qui nulla rationalia, neque sapientiam habent, sed nudas tantum imagina- 
tiones, et cogitationes. Reason, therefore, according to this judicious rabbi, 
was always in exercise during the prophetic ecstasy. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



247 



potent of all rational beings, who, w T hile he is capable of con- 
veying his mind to his creatures, is incapable of making them 
sensible that he does so. When Jacob awoke out of his 
sleep, he certainly knew (by w T hat criterion we cannot tell) 
that the visionary dream, with which he had been favoured, 
was of God ; Gen. xxviii. 16. Pharaoh, though a heathen 
king, knew 7 his dream was extraordinary and prophetic, as ap- 
pears by his spirit being so troubled about it, and by his send- 
ing for all the magicians and wise men of Egypt to explain it 
to him ; Gen. xli. 8. And Nebuchadnezzar was sure he had 
had an extraordinary prophetic dream, though he could not 
recollect it. Otherwise we cannot suppose he would have 
been so exceeding angry at the wise men of Babylon, for not 
revealing and explaining it to him ; Dan. ii. 12. And no 
doubt God gave Abraham likewise such irresistible evidence 
and assurance, that it was he w r ho commanded him to sacri- 
fice his son Isaac, as overcame all the reluctance of paternal 
affection, and whatever reason might object against so unna- 
tural a sacrifice, or he would never have set about it. 

Thus much for the criteria by which the prophets might 
know, that their dreams or visions, and other revelations, came 
from God. 

Before we have done with this head, it will be proper to 
inquire, by what criteria other persons might judge and be 
assured, that the revelations which the prophets delivered, 
were true divine revelations. 

Here it must be observed, that if the prophet delivered any 
thing that was contradictory to the invariable law of nature, 
it was to be rejected, and he was to be treated as a false pro- 
phet, even though he produced miracles in evidence of his 
mission from God; Deut xiii. 1 — 3. For it was a much 
more supposeable case, that the devil might counterfeit mira- 
cles, than that God would contradict the immutable law of 
nature. 

But if nothing which the prophet delivered was contrary to 
that law, then his divine mission might be evidenced various 
ways : — 

1st. By the sanctity of his own life,* which afforded very 

* Maimon. de Fundament. Legis, cap. vii. seet. i. ii. p, 87 — 89, edit, et 
interpret, Vorstii, Amstel. 1680. 



248 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book [. 



probable ground to believe, that he did not counterfeit and 
pretend revelations which had not been made to him. Upon 
this evidence, Herod regarded John the Baptist as a divine 
prophet. He " feared John, knowing that he was a just man 
and holy;" Mark vi. 20. 

2dly. By the testimony of other prophets of undoubted ve- 
racity.* Thus Moses bore testimony to Joshua, when he gave 
, ..him a charge in the name of God before all the congregation; 
Deut. xxxi. 23. And John the Baptist, whom the Jews ac- 
knowledged to be a prophet, bore witness to Christ; John i. 
29, 30. 

3dly. Sometimes his mission was proved by miracles ; as 
the mission of Moses to the people of Israel, Exod. iv. 1 — 10, 
and afterward to Pharaoh, chap. vii. 9. 

4thly. At other times by some sudden and remarkable 
judgment from God, upon such as slighted and rejected the 
message he delivered in the name of the Lord : as on Jero- 
boam, when he commanded the man of God to be taken into 
custody for the prediction he delivered, 1 Kings xiii. 1 — 6 ; 
and in the case of Elijah's calling down fire from heaven, to 
consume the captains and troops of the king of Samaria; 
2 Kings i. 9—12. 

5thly. By the accomplishment of his predictions ; whereas, 
if what he foretold did not come to pass, he was to be treated 
as a false prophet; Deut. xviii. 22. Yet this rule was not to 
hold concerning the predictions of judgments, but only of 
good things or favourable events ; see Jer. xxviii. 9. But 
as for prophetic threatenings, they were supposed to be con- 
ditional, and that the judgments or punishments denounced 
might be averted by repentance. It is evident, the Nine- 
vites understood Jonah's prediction of the destruction of their 
city in forty days in this sense, though delivered without any 
condition expressed ; Jonah iii. 4. Otherwise, they would 
have had no encouragement to repent, in hopes that thereby 
the judgment might be averted ; ver. 9. It was, therefore, no 
evidence against Jonah's being a true prophet, commissioned 
of God, that this his prediction was not fulfilled .f 

It is very proper, while we are upon the subject of pro- 

* Maimon. de Fundament. Legis, cap. x. sect. ix. p. 147. 
f Maimon. de Fundament. Legis, cap. x.~sect. ii. — viii. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



249 



phetic dreams and visions, to inquire whether the accounts 
of the several symbolical actions, said to be done by the pro- 
phets, are histories of real facts, or only relations of their 
dreams and visions. Such as Isaiah's walking naked and bare- 
foot three years, " for a sign and wonder" upon Egypt and 
Ethiopia, chap. xx. 2, 3 ; Jeremiah's hiding his girdle in a 
rock by Euphrates, chap. xiii. 4, 5 ; Ezekiel's mock siege of 
Jerusalem, chap. iv. ; Hosea's taking a wife of whoredom, 
chap. i. 2 ; and several others. 

Learned men, of considerable reputation, have been divided 
in their sentiments on this question. Abarbanel and R. Solo- 
mon among the Jews, and the generality of Christian writers 
before Calvin, understood these narratives in the literal sense, 
as histories of real facts. On the other side, Aben-Ezra and 
Maimonides, * and, since Calvin, several other Christian 
writers take them to be only relations of prophetic dreams 
and visions. 

The principal argument alleged to prove these actions were 
really done, is, that several of them are said to be signs to the 
people : as Isaiah's walking naked and barefoot, Ezekiel's 
mock siege of Jerusalem, chap. iv. 3, and his removing his 
household goods ; chap. xii. 6. Now, it is said, how could 
that be a sign to any people, which never was presented be- 
fore them, but only acted in the imagination of the prophet ? 
To this, however, it may be replied, that these expressions, 
" this shall be a sign," or " I have set thee to be a sign to 
the house of Israel," were a part of the dream or vision ; the 
prophet imagining not only that he saw and did certain things 
or actions, but that he heard such declarations concerning the 
end for which they were designed. These were, therefore, 
imaginary signs, given to imaginary persons ; but when after- 
ward the vision was revealed to the real persons, for whose 
use it was intended, it must have the same effect upon them 
(provided they believed it to be a divine vision) as if it had 
been a real fact, and transacted before their eyes. And thus 
what was done in vision was properly a sign to them to whom 
it was declared and applied by the prophet. 

On the other hand, to prove that these symbolical actions 
of the prophets were done only in imagination, or that the ac- 
* Vid. Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part. ii. cap. xlvi. 



250 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 



counts of them are mere narratives of the prophets' dreams 
or visions, it is alleged, 

1st. That several of the things said to be done, are highly 
improbable, if not impossible to be really performed. For 
instance, that Isaiah should walk naked and barefooted three 
years together, summer and winter, even if you understand 
by his being naked, merely being without his upper garment : 
that Jeremiah should send yokes to the king of Edom, and 
to the king of Moab, and to the king of the Ammonites, and 
to the king of Tyrus, and to the king of Zidon, Jer. xxvii. 
3 ; and that he should take so long a journey as from Jeru- 
salem to the Euphrates, which is about five hundred miles, to 
hide his girdle in a rock; and that after it was rotted, he 
should take the same long journey to fetch it back again, 
chap. xiii. 4. 6, 7 ; and that he should take a wine-cup from 
God, and carry it up and down to all nations, far and near, 
even all the kingdoms which are upon the face of the earth, 
and make them drink it, — is more than improbable; chap, 
xxv. 15 — 29. So likewise that Ezekiel should actually eat 
a roll, which God gave him, chap. iii. 1. 3; and that he 
should lie upon his left side three hundred and ninety days 
together, and after that forty days together on his right side, 
with bands upon him that he could not turn from one side to 
the other, chap, iv., is not only extremely improbable upon 
several accounts, but hardly possible to be done in the time 
allotted to this whole affair ; for it all passed between the pro- 
phet's seeing his first vision at the river Kebar, which was on 
the fifth day of the fourth month, in the fifth year of king Je- 
hoiachin's captivity, chap. i. 1, 2, and his sitting in his house 
with the elders of Judah on the fifth day of the sixth month of 
the sixth year, chap. viii. 1 ; that is, within a year and two 
months. Now the Jewish year, being lunar, consisted of three 
hundred fifty-four days, and their month of twenty-nine days 
and thirty days alternately ; therefore a year and two months 
(three hundred fifty-four, twenty-nine, and thirty, added to- 
gether) could amount to no more than four hundred and thir- 
teen days ; which falls short of the number of days, during 
which the prophet is said to lie on his side, namely, four 
hundred and thirty days, by seventeen days. And if you de- 
duct also, from the four hundred and thirteen days, the seven 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



251 



days which he sat among the captives at Telabib, chap. iii. 
15, there remains but four hundred and six days; which are 
twenty-four days short of four hundred and thirty. 

The only colour of an answer which I have met with to 
this argument, is, that possibly this might be an embolymean 
year, in which a whole month was intercalated ; as it was once 
in three years; or, more exactly, there were seven emboly- 
mean years in nineteen, in order to reduce the lunar year to 
the solar. On this supposition, indeed, there will be time 
enough for the prophet's lying on his side, in the literal sense, 
four hundred and thirty days. But this solution is too subtle 
for common readers. Four hundred and thirty days, with 
the addition of seven days when the prophet sat at Telabib, 
amount to a year and nearly three months in common compu- 
tation ; and can it be thought the sacred writer would have 
allotted but a year and two months for the whole affair (sup- 
posing it to be a history of real fact), without the least hint 
how the glaring contradiction, which would stare every body 
in the face on the first reading, might possibly be reconciled ? 

To this head of impossibilities we may refer God's bringing 
Abraham abroad into the field, and showing him the stars, 
Gen. xv. 5; since it appears, that it was not yet sun-set: 
" when the sun was going down," it is said, " a great sleep 
fell upon Abraham;" ver. 12. From whence it is manifest, 
that his going out before to view the stars, his ordering several 
living creatures for sacrifice, and his driving away the fowls 
that came down upon the carcasses, were all performed in 
prophetic vision only ; as is indeed intimated when it is said, 
"The word of the Lord came unto Abraham in a vision;" 
ver. 1. 

2dly. There are some things said to be done by the pro- 
phets, in their narratives of these symbolical actions, which 
could not be really done without sin ; and therefore we may 
conclude, that neither did God order them, nor did they really 
do them ; but all was transacted in the prophet's imagination, 
in a dream or vision only. Thus the prophet Hosea is said, 
at the command of God, to take a wife of whoredom, that is, 
a whore ; and to have three children by her, which are called 
the children of whoredom, that is, bastards; Hos. i. 2. Those 
who will have this to be real fact, allege, that she is called a 



252 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



wife of whoredom; which intimates, they say, that though 
she had been a lewd person, yet the prophet was legally mar- 
ried to her. But they forget, that the children which she bore 
him are called children of whoredom. Besides, he is ordered 
to "love another woman, an adulteress/' chap. iii. 1, and is 
said to have bought or hired her for " fifteen pieces of silver, 
and a homer and a half of barley, to abide with him many 
days," ver, 2, 3 : circumstances which evidently point out a 
lewd mistress, not a lawful wife. 

Now can it be supposed, that the prophet Hosea, the 
chief scope of whose prophecy is to discover sin, and to 
denounce the judgments of God upon a people that would 
not be reformed, would himself be guilty of such an immoral 
and scandalous practice as to cohabit with one harlot after 
another? Much less can it be thought, that God would have 
commanded him so to do. It is far more likely, that the 
whole narrative is a relation of his prophetic dreams, in which 
matters were represented to his senses, that would by no 
means have been fit to be done in reality ; which dreams fur- 
nished out an awakening and very instructive parable to the 
people of Israel and Judah, who were intended by the two 
harlots. 

3dly. A farther argument to prove, that these symbolical 
actions were only performed in the imaginations of the pro- 
phets, is drawn from their own narratives, by the learned 
Mr. Smith, in his Discourse on Prophecy. # He observes, 
that the prophets use a different style, when relating their 
imaginary symbolical actions, and when speaking of what they 
really did. In the former case they commonly speak in the 
first person, as " I did so and so," and " the Lord said so 
and so to me;" whereas in the latter case they speak of them- 
selves in the third person, after the manner of historians re- 
lating a matter of fact. Thus, after an account of one of 
these symbolical actions, namely, the prophet's getting a 
potter's earthen bottle, and taking with him the ancients of 
the people, and the ancients of the priests, and conducting 
them to the valley of the son of Hinnom, and there breaking 
the bottle before them, Jer. xix.; it follows, "then came 

' * See Smith's Select Discourses, Discourse on Prophecy, chap. vi. p. 218, 
2d edit. Cambridge, 1673. 



CHAP. VI J 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



253 



Jeremiah from Tophet, whither the Lord had sent him to 
prophecy, and he stood in the court of the Lord's house 
ver. 14. Now Mr. Smith supposes, that when the prophet 
thus spoke of himself in the third person, he related some real 
fact; and that Jeremiah, therefore, really wore a yoke on his 
neck, which thefalse prophet Hananiah broke ; chap, xxviii. 10. 
However, this observation will hardly hold universally; for 
Hosea relates the story of his cohabiting with the former 
adulteress in the third person, chap, i, and of his cohabiting 
with the second in the first person ; chap. iii. Yet there is no 
reason to believe one was real fact, any more than the other. 
Though this argument, therefore, must be acknowledged to 
be ingenious, no stress can be laid upon it. And so the two 
former arguments, it is presumed, are sufficient to satisfy us, 
that many of the Scripture narratives of the symbolical actions 
of the prophets are only relations of their prophetic dreams or 
visions. 

2dly. Another way, in which secrets were revealed to the 
prophets, was by inspiration ; that is, when something was 
suggested to the mind of the prophet while he was awake, 
without any such scenical representation to his imagination or 
fancy as is made in dreams and visions. The Jewish writers 
distinguish inspiration into several degrees, the chief of which, 
and indeed all that are worth our notice, are what they call 
W\pn nn ruach hakkodhesh, or the Holy Spirit, and the 
gradus Mosaicus, the degree of Moses, which they make to 
be the highest of all. 

The 1st, tinpn nn ruach hakkodhesh, is thus distinguished 
by Maimonides, When a man perceives some power to arise 
within and rest upon him, which urgeth him to speak ; inso- 
much that, under this impulse, he either discourses concerning 
arts and sciences, or utters psalms and hymns, or useful and 
salutary precepts for the conduct of life, or matter political 
and civil, or sacred and divine ; and that while he is awake, 
and has the ordinary use and vigour of his senses ; this is 
such a one, concerning whom it is said, that he speaks by the 
Holy Spirit.* And thus St. Peter says, that " prophecy 
came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men spake 
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost;" 2 Pet. i. 21. Such 
* Maimon. More Nevoch. part ii. cap. xlv. p. 317. 



254 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book t. 



was the inspiration of Zacharias, of whom it is said, that " he 
was filled with the Holy Ghost and prophesied/' Luke i. 67 ; 
and also of his wife Elizabeth, who f was filled with the Holy 
Ghost, and spake with a loud voice/' &c, ver. 41, 42- What 
they delivered was immediately suggested to their minds by 
the Holy Ghost. This kind of inspiration was calm and 
gentle, and did not throw the prophet into those fears and con- 
sternations, and disorders of body, which the prophetic dreams 
and visions sometimes did ;f but he continued, all the time 
the afflatus was upon him, in full possession of himself. And 
by this circumstance divine inspiration was distinguished from 
the pseudo-prophetical spirit of the heathens, and other pre- 
tenders to prophecy; which if it did indeed, without dissimu- 
lation, enter into any person, its energy seems to have been 
merely on the imagination or fancy, which was thereby so 
disturbed, that the prophet was thrown into a sort of fury or 
madness. Thus Virgil represents the Sybil as distracted and 
raving when the prophetic afflatus came upon her, in a pas- 
sage quoted before. The Pythian prophetess is described by 
Lucanf as full of fury, when she was inspired by the pro- 
phetic spirit, and uttering her oracles with her hair torn, and 
foaming at the mouth, with many antic gestures. And Cas- 
sandra is represented by Lycophron as prophesying in the 
same manner. J 

This sort of enthusiastic ecstasy was accounted by the 
primitive fathers to be a sure diagnostic of a false prophet. 
Hence Miltiades made it an objection against the Monta- 
nists;§ and Clemens Alexandrinus saith of those who made 
false pretences to prophecy, that they prophesied being in an 
ecstasy, like the servants of the devil. || Tertullian, who was 
a friend to the Montanists, grants they were sometimes 

* See Jer. xxiii. 9; Ezek. iii. 14; Dan. vii. 15, viii. 27; Hab. iii. 2; 
and perhaps to this class we may also refer Isa. xxi. 2, 3, though Jonathan 
the targumist and some others understand the prophet as here speaking in 
the person of the Chaldeans, and representing the horrors and anguish that 
should come upon them. 

f Lucan, lib. v. 1. 142 — 218, passim. 

X Lycoph. Cassandr. ab init. 

§ Euseb. Eccles. Histor. lib. v. cap. xvii. p. 232, 233, edit. Cantab. 1720. 
|| Strom, lib. i. p. 311, D. edit. Paris, 1641. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



255 



ecstatical in their prophetic dreams or visions, but denies they 
fell into any rage or fury, which he seems to admit is the 
character of a false prophet.* St. Jerome, in his preface to 
Isaiah, says, " the prophets did not speak in ecstasies, neither 
did they speak they knew not what; nor were they, when 
they went about to instruct others, ignorant of what they said 
themselves." St. Chrysostom is of the same opinion.f " It 
is the property of a diviner," says he, " to be ecstatical, to 
undergo some violence, to be tossed and hurried about like a 
madman; but it is otherwise with the prophet, whose under- 
standing is awake, and his mind in a sober and orderly tem- 
per, and he knows every thing he saith." Hence we may 
infer what opinion these fathers would have entertained of the 
ecstatic fits of the modern French prophets, Quakers, Me- 
thodists, and Moravians. 

The energy of the pseudo-prophetic spirit is farther repre- 
sented as irresistible by the prophets themselves ; so that they 
could not withstand it, nor suppress its dictates, but must 
immediately utter what it suggested. Thus Virgil represents 
the Sybil, in her raving fit, as striving, but in vain, to shake 
off the prophetic afflatus, while it returned upon her with so 
much the more violence, and forced her to utter prophecies. 

At Phcebi nondum patiens, immanis in antro 
Bacchatur vates, magnum si pectore possit 
Excussisse Deum; tanto magis ille fatigat 
Os rabidum, fera cordadomans finitque premendo. 

^neid. vi. 1. 77, &c. 

On the contrary, the true prophets were only (pspojuLsvoi ano 
irvEVfiaroQ ayiov, 2 Pet. i. 21, " moved by the Holy Ghost," as 
we render it. The word imports a more gentle influence and 
suggestion, without any thing of force and violence upon the 
mind; such an influence as no way disturbed and hindered, 
but rather promoted the exercise of reason and prudence. 
For the verb (fnpw signifies to uphold, support, bear, or carry ; 
as the tree bears fruit, John xv. 5 ; and as Christ is said to 
" uphold all things by the word of his power," Heb. i. 3, 
Qtptov TairavTa, &c. The sense of which may perhaps be 
expressed by those beautiful lines of Virgil : 

* Tertull. de Anima, cap. xlv. p. 297, D. edit. Rigalt. 
f Vid. Horn. xxix. in t. Cor. 



256 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



Principio coelum, ac terras, camposque liquentes 
Lucentemque globura lunse, titaniaque astra 
Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus 
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet. 

iEneid, vi. 1. 724, et seq. 
And the prophets of God being thus moved by the Spirit, 
in the full exercise of their own reason and prudence, may 
give light to that passage of the apostle Paul, " The spirits 
of the prophets are subject to the prophets," 1 Cor. xiv. 32 ; 
or, as viroTaaatrai may perhaps be more justly rendered, are 
under the direction of, or are to be ordered by the prophets; 
and it is most naturally interpreted by QEcumenius* and 
Theophylactf as spoken in opposition to the heathen prophets ; 
who, when the afflatus was upon them, could not be silent if 
they would; whereas a true divine afflatus was so far subject 
to the reason and discretion of the prophet, that he could wait 
till it was proper to deliver what had been suggested to him ; 
and, therefore, they might all, as the apostle directs, prophesy 
one by one, ver. 31, and so avoid that confusion and tumult, 
which several persons speaking together would necessarily 
occasion, and to which the Spirit of God did no way constrain 
them ; 1 Cor. xiv. 33. 

2dly. The highest degree of inspiration is, according to the 
Jewish doctors, the gradus Mosaicus; which Maimonides 
makes to excel that of any other prophet in four particulars : — 
1st. That Moses received his revelation awake, and in the 
full use of his reason and senses ; whereas God manifested 
himself to all other prophets by dreams and visions, when 
their senses were locked up, and as it were useless. 

2dly. That Moses prophesied without the mediation of any 
angelic power, whereas all the rest prophesied by the help of 
the ministry of angels. 

3dly. That all other prophets were afraid and troubled, and 
fainted when the divine afflatus was upon them. But Moses 
was not so affected ; for the Scripture says, " God spake unto 
him as a man speaketh unto his friend." 

4tbly. That Moses could prophesy at all times, when he 
would, which the other prophets could not.J 

* (Ecumen. Comment, inloc. vol. i. p. 564, D. edit. Paris, 1630. 

t Theophyl. Comment, in Epist. in loc. p. 288, 289, edit. Lond. 1636. 

t Vid. Maimon. de Fundament. Legis, cap. vii. sect.vi. — ix. p. 96 — 104. 



CHAP. -VI.] 



OP THE PROPHETS. 



257 



The first and third of these distinctions differ not at all from 
the iiHpn nn ruach hakkodhesh; the second is certainly a 
mistake, for " the law was given by the disposition of angels, 
by the hand of a mediator," namely, Moses, Gal. iii. 19; and 
the last is quite uncertain. We dismiss them all, therefore, 
as not worthy any farther notice. 

As for the preference which the Scripture gives to Moses 
above the other prophets, " There arose not a prophet since 
in Israel, like to Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face," 
Deut. xxxiv. 10; Le Clerc is for confining it to the time 
which had elapsed since the death of Moses to the writing of 
the chapter in which this passage is contained ; or we may 
possibly extend it to all the following ages of the Old Testa- 
ment dispensation. 

Moses was the greatest prophet, as God delivered his law 
by him to Israel ; as he wrought more miracles than any of 
the rest, ver. 11, 12; and perhaps also as he had greater in- 
timacy with God, and had more of the divine will revealed to 
him than was revealed to any other; which may be the mean- 
ing of the Lord's knowing him face to face, or speaking to 
him £f face to face," Exod. xxxiii. 11; for in such a sense the 
phrase of seeing " face to face" is used in the following pas- 
sage of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, " Now we see 
through a glass darkly, but then face to face," chap. xiii. 12; 
importing the clear and perfect knowledge of the heavenly 
state, in contradistinction, not only to the scanty knowledge 
of the Jewish state and dispensation, which is compared to 
seeing only the shadow of things, but also to the imperfect 
though improved knowledge of the gospel state, which is 
compared to the seeing the image of a thing in a glass 
darkly. 

3dly. Another way, in which secrets were revealed to the 
prophets, was by voices ; as to the child Samuel ; 1 Sam. iii. 
One would suppose, this should be as excellent a manner, and 
as high a degree of revelation as any whatever; and, indeed, 
it seems to have been the true gradus Mosaicus, or the man- 
ner of God's revealing the law to Moses ; with whom, in the 
book of Exodus, he is said to have spoken face to face, as a 
man speaks to his friend, chap, xxxiii. 11 ; and in the book of 
Numbers, <e mouth to mouth, even apparently:" which manner 

s 



258 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



of revelation is at the same time preferred to that by dreams 
and visions; see Numb. xii. 6 — 8. Nevertheless, the Jewish 
doctors make this, which they call the Vip rQ bath kol, jilia 
vox seu filia vocis, to be the very lowest degree of prophecy, 
or rather to succeed in the room of prophecy. Rabbi Isaac, 
the author of the book Cozri, says, " There is a tradition, 
that the men of the great synagogue were commanded to be 
skilled in all sciences; principally because prophecy was never 
taken from them, or at least that which supplied its room, 
the b)p fO bath &o/." # Dr. Lightfoot says, that both the 
talmudical and later rabbies make frequent mention of "?ip J"Q 
bath kol, which served under the second temple as their ut- 
most refuge of revelation. They call it b)p ro bath kol, or 
the daughter of the voice, in relation to the oracle of Urim 
and Thummim ; which, according to them, was delivered by 
an articulate voice from the mercy-seat. But upon the cessa- 
tion of that oracle, this came in its place, which is therefore 
called the daughter r successor of that voice. For an 
instance of the iflp ro bath kol, the Doctor gives us this, out 
of a multitude that are to be found in the talmudists : " When 
Jonathan, the son of Uzziel, had composed the Targum of the 
Prophets, there came b)p j"D bath kol, and said, Who hath 
revealed my secrets to the sons of men ? And when he went 
about to explain the cherubim, there came bip J"Q bath kol, 
and said, It is enough. "f 

But if the b)p J"Q bath kol was in reality what the Jewish 
writers pretend, a miraculous voice from God, the daughter 
should seem to be equal with the mother; and it is hard to 
say on what account this sort of revelation was inferior to any 
other. Dr. Prideaux hath cleared up this difficulty, and, 
from another instance in the Talmud, hath shown what sort of 
an oracle the b)p JTQ bath kol was.l The passage which he 
quotes, out of many more instances, as he says, of the same 
sort, is this : " Rabbi Jochanan and Rabbi Simeon Ben La- 
chish desiring to see the face of Rabbi Samuel, a Babylonish 
doctor, Let us follow, said they, the hearing of b)p J~Q bath kol. 
Travelling therefore near a school, they heard the voice of a 

* Vid. lib. Cozri, part iii. sect. xli. p. 216, 217, edit. Buxtorf. Basil, 1660. 
f See Lightfoot's Harmony on Matt. iii. 16. 
I Connect, part ii. chap. ii. sub anno 107. 



G HAP. VI.] 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



259 



boy reading these words from the First Book of Samuel, ' And 
Samuel died ;' chap. xxv. 1. Observing this, they inferred 
that their friend Samuel was dead, and so they found it had 
happened, for Samuel of Babylon was then dead/' This in- 
stance sufficiently shows us, that their b)p rn bath kol was no 
such voice from Heaven as they pretended, but only a fantas- 
tical way of divination of mere human invention. They applied 
to b)p ra bath kol the next words they accidentally heard from 
any body's mouth ; and this they called a voice from Heaven, 
because they fancied that hereby the judgment and decree of 
Heaven were declared, concerning any future events, of which 
they desired to be pre-informed. 

From this account of the b)p rQ bath kol, we may judge, 
how absurd it is to imagine, as several divines have done, that 
St. Peter refers to it, and allows, according to the Jewish 
notion, the voice from Heaven to be inferior to prophecy, in the 
following remarkable passage of his Second Epistle, which I 
will recite at large : " For we have not followed cunningly- 
devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of 
his majesty. For he received from God the Father, honour 
and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the ex- 
cellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well 
pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard 
when we were with him in the holy mount. We have also a 
more sure word of prophecy, whereunto ye do well that ye 
take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place," &c. 
The voice that St. Peter here speaks of was quite different 
from the b)p rD bath kol ; it was the voice of the same God 
who spake by his Spirit to the prophets ; and none of them 
could be more sure of the divine inspiration, by which they 
wrote their prophecies, than St. Peter and his two com- 
panions were, of what they heard and saw on the mount of 
Christ's transfiguration. 

It is a question, however, on what account St. Peter styles 
the writings of the prophets a more sure word of prophecy, 
fizfiaioTtpov tov TTpotyriTitcov \oyov, than that voice from Heaven. 
Some, as Gomarus and Grotius, refer the word ^jdaiorspov to 
that voice from Heaven, by which the Old Testament prophe- 

s 2 



260 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book I. 



cies concerning Christ were now made more sure, or had re- 
ceived an additional confirmation ; for fiefiaiooj, in several 
places of the New Testament, signifies to confirm.* Other- 
wise, it may be thus understood : The writings of the ancient 
prophets had been more confirmed by the actual accomplish- 
ment of a number of their own predictions, than the testimony 
of these three apostles, who declared they had heard the voice 
from Heaven, had yet been ; and the refore, to other persons they 
were fitfiaioTtpog Xoyoc, a word more fully confirmed than this 
voice from Heaven, especially to the Jews, who were firmly 
established in the belief of the divine inspiration of the Old 
Testament Prophets, and to them the apostle is chiefly 
writing. 

The sense in which Dr. Sherlock understands this passage 
seems to be the easiest and most natural ; namely, that the 
only event to which the word prophecy here refers, is " the 
power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ;" that is, his 
second glorious appearance for the destruction of his enemies, 
and the salvation of his people. Now it was a strong pre- 
sumption, that Christ would come in glory, that they had 
already seen him glorified on the mount of transfiguration ; 
and it was a farther evidence of his power to deliver his ser- 
vants, that God had openly declared him to be his well-be- 
loved Son ; but to assure them, that he would so come, and so 
use his power, they had " a more sure word of prophecy," 
the very word of God, speaking by his prophets, both of the 
Old and the New Testament, to whom all futurity is known, 
to assure us of the certainty of this future event.f 

It is possible the Jews might learn their divination by 
Tip nn bath kol from the heathens, or the heathens a like 
sort of divination from the Jews. For the bath kol was 
much of the same kind with the Sortes Horn-erica, and Sortes 
Virgiliana, which were much practised by the Greeks and 
Romans, especially after their other oracles ceased on the 
coming of Christ. The difference was, the Jews took their 
oracle from the first words they heard any body pronounce ; 
the heathens, from the first they cast their eyes upon, on open- 

* This appears from 2 Pet. iii. 1, 2, compared with 1 Pet. i. 1. 

f See Sherlock's Discourses on Prophecy, disc. i. especially p. 20— 23 = 



CHAP. VI. J 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



261 



ing Homer or Virgil, in which they endeavoured to discover 
a meaning suitable to the matter concerning which they 
inquired.* 

The Christians, when their religion came to be corrupted, 
adopted this trick of divination from the heathens, only using 
the Bible instead of Homer or Virgil. The practice appears 
to have been as ancient as Austin, who lived in the fourth 
century. He mentions it in his hundred and ninth epistle to 
Januarius ; and though he disallows it in secular, he seems to 
approve it in spiritual affairs. Dr. Prideaux says it obtained 
mostly in the west, especially in France, where for several 
ages it was the practice, on the consecration of a new bishop, 
to consult the Bible concerning him, in this way of divination, 
by which they made a judgment of his life, and manners, and 
future behaviour ; and this they made a part of their public 
offices. f 

* Potter's Antiquities, vol. i. chap. xv. p. 302. 

Dr. Welwood, in his Memoirs, tells this remarkable story of King 
Charles I., that, being at Oxford during the civil wars, he went to see the 
public library, where he was showed a fine edition of Virgil. And Lord 
Falkland, to divert the king, would have him make trial of his fortune by 
the Sortes Virgilianse ; upon which the king opened the book at Dido's im- 
precation against iEneas, where she wished he might be conquered by his 
enemies, his friends slain in battle, and himself come to an untimely 
death. 

At bello audacis populi vexatus et armis, 

Finibus extorris, complexu avulsus Jiili, 

Auxilium imploret, videatque indigna suorum 

Funera: nec cum se sub leges pacis iniquse 

Tradiderit, regno aut optata luce fruatur ; 

Sed cadat ante diem, mediaque inhumatus arena. 

Hsec precor. iEneid, iv. 1. 615 — 622. 

The king seemed concerned at the augury : upon which Lord Falkland 
would try his fortune in the same manner ; but the place he stumbled upon 
was more suited to his destiny than the other was to the king's, being the 
expressions of Evander upon the untimely death of his son Pallas : 

Non hsec, O Palla, dederas promissa parenti, 

Cautius ut saevo velles te credere Marti. 

Haud ignarus eram, quantum nova gloria in armis 

Et prsedulce decus primo certamine posset. 

Primitise juvenis miserse, bellique propinqui 

Dura rudimenta! iEneid, xi. 1. 152—157. 

f Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book v. p. 463, 464, edit. 10. See also 
Du Fresne's Glossar. in voc. Sortes Sanctorum. 



262 



JEWISH A N TIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



We have many instances in history of the use of these 
Sortes Sanctorum, as they were called, though they were 
condemned by the council of Agda, anno 506, at the time 
they were beginning to take footing in France. # However, 
blind superstition prevailed above the decree of the council 
for several ages, till more light and knowledge springing up 
at the Reformation, those fooleries, which had so long obtained 
among Heathens, Jews, and Christians, are now in a manner 
extinguished. Thus much for the third way of revelation by 
voices. 

As for the fourth, namely, by angels, there seems to be no 
reason to make it, as the Jews do, distinct from the three former ; 
since Moses received the law that was revealed to him by the 
" ministry of angels Gal. iii. 19. Probably the visions which 
the prophets saw, as well as the voices which they heard, were 
formed by angels : seelsa.vi.3; Dan. viii. 16, 17 ; Rev. v.2,&c. 
And how far their ministry might be employed in suggesting 
things more immediately to the minds of the prophets, who can 
pretend to determine ? Thus much for the manner in which God 
revealed secrets to the prophets. 

Godwin observes, that, for the propagation of learning, 
colleges and schools were in divers places erected for the 
prophets. The first intimation we have in Scripture of these 
schools is in a passage of the First Book of Samuel, where we 
read of " a company of prophets coming down from the high 
place with a psaltery, a tabret, a pipe, and a harp before them, 
and they did prophesy 1 Sam. x. 5. They are supposed to 
be the students in a college of prophets at ny2J gibnath, or 
" the hill," as we render it, " of God." Our translators else- 
where retain the same Hebrew word, as supposing it to be 
the proper name of a place, 1 Sam. xiii. 3 ; " Jonathan 
smote the garrison of the Philistines that was in Geba." 
Some persons have imagined, that the ark, or at least a syna- 
gogue, or some place of public worship, was at this time at 
Geba, and that this is the reason of its being styled in the for- 
mer passage D^n^n njDJ gibnath Haelohim, the hill of God. 
We read afterward of such another company of prophets at 
Naioth in Ramah, " prophesying, and Samuel standing as 
appointed over them 1 Sam. xix. 19, 20. Ramah, other- 
* Canon, xlii. Du Pin's Eccles. Hist. Anno 506, vol. vi. p. 112. 



CHAP. V I.J 



OF THE PROPHETS. 



263 



wi>e called Ramathaim-zophim, was Samuel's birth-place, 
where his parents lived ; 1 Sam. i. 1, compared with ver. 19. 
Some imagine it was called D>9K tsophim, from HDV tsaphah, 
specu/atus est, because of the school of the prophets, or 
seers, that was there; for this title HDi* tsoplieh, is given to 
the prophet Ezekiel : " I have made thee a watchman, HDJf 
tsop/ieh, to the house of Israel:" Ezek. iii. 17. 

The students in these colleges were called sons of the 
prophets, who are frequently mentioned in after ages, even in 
the most degenerate times. Thus we read of the sons of the 
prophets that w T ere at Bethel, 2 Kings ii. 3: and of another 
school at Jericho, ver. 5 ; and of the sons of the prophets at 
Gilgal; chap. iv. 38. It should seem, that these sons of the 
prophets were very numerous ; for of this sort were probablv 
the prophets of the Lord, whom Jezebel cut off; " but Oba- 
diah took an hundred of them, and hid them bv fifty in a 
cave;" 1 Kings xviii. 4. In these schools young men were 
educated under a proper master, who was commonlv, if not 
always, an inspired prophet, in the knowledge f religion and 
in sacred music (see 1 Sam. x. 5, and xix. 20), and were 
thereby qualified to be public preachers, which seems to have 
been part of the business of the prophets on the sabbath-days 
and festivals: 2 Kings iv 23. It should seem, that God 
generally chose the prophets, whom he inspired, out of these 
schools. Amos, therefore, speaks of it as an extraordinary 
case, that though he was not one of the sons of the prophets, 
but an herdman, " yet the Lord took him as he followed the 
flock, and said unto him, Go, prophesy unto my people 
Israel:" Amos vii. 14, 15. That it was usual for some of 
these schools, or at least for their tutors, to be endued with a 
prophetic spirit, appears from the relation in the Second Book 
of Kings, of the prophecies concerning the ascent of Elijah, 
delivered to Elisha by the sons of the prophets, both at Jericho 
and at Bethel: 2 Kino-s ii. 3. 5. The houses in which they 
lived, were generally mean, and of their own building; chap, 
vi. 2 — 4. Their food was chiefly pottage of herbs, chap. iv. 
38, 39, unless when the people sent them some better pro- 
vision, as bread, parched corn, honey, dried fruits, and the 
like: 1 Kings xiv. 3; 2 Kings iv. 42. Their dress was plain 
and coarse, tied about with a leathern girdle: Zech. xiii. 4: 



264 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



2 Kings i. 8. Riches were no temptation to them; therefore 
Elisha not only refused Naaman's presents, but punished his 
servant Gehazi very severely for clandestinely obtaining a 
small share of them; 2 Kings v. 15, &c. This recluse and 
abstemious way of life, together with the meanness of their 
attire, gave them so strange an air, especially among the 
courtiers, that they looked upon them as no better than mad- 
men; chap. ix. 11. It was, perhaps, the uncouth dress 
and appearance of the prophet Elisha, which made the chil- 
dren at Bethel follow and mock him; chap. ii. 23. The 
freedom which the prophets used in reproving even princes 
for their evil deeds, frequently exposed them to persecution, 
imprisonment, and sometimes to death, under the reigns of 
wicked kings, such as Ahab and Manasseh. Nevertheless, 
in the main they were much respected, and treated with great 
reverence and regard by the better and wiser sort of people, 
even those of the highest rank; 1 Kings xviii. 7; 2 Kings i. 
13, and xiii. 14. This is all we certainly know of the pro- 
phets and their schools. 5 * As for the account which some 
have ventured to give, of their living in perpetual celibacy, 
poverty, and the like, in the manner of the monks and friars 
among the Papists, it is mere fancy and imagination ; it being 
certain, that several of the prophets were married, and had 
children, particularly Samuel, Ezekiel, and Isaiah, whose wife 
is called a prophetess; Isa. viii. 3. And it was the widow 
of one of the sons of the prophets, whose oil Elisha miracu- 
lously multiplied; 2 Kings iv. L Huldah, the prophetess, 
dwelt in Jerusalem in the college, chap. xxii. 14, probably 
in the college of the sons of the prophets, her husband 
Shallum being, it is likely, one of the number. So much for 
the prophets. 

Next to the prophets Godwin speaks of the wise men, 
□'►DDIl chachamim, from DDn chacham, sapuit; a title applied 
in general to such as were skilful in the law, and who taught 
and explained it to others. Dr. Lightfoot, from the rabbies, 
speaks of a certain officer in the Sanhedrim, who was called 
the DDPT chacham, icar e^o^nv. But in what his dignity and 
office consisted is very uncertain. f What the wise men were 

* Vide Vitring. de Synag. Vet. lib. i. part ii. cap, vi. vii. 
f See Horse Hebraicse in Luc. x. 25. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE WISE MEN. 



265 



in the Scripture sense of that appellation appears from hence, 
that those who in the twenty-third of St. Matthew are 
called (TO(j>oi, ver. 34, in the parallel place in St. Luke are 
styled cnroaroXoi, chap. xi. 49, not meaning in particular those 
twelve disciples of Christ, who were ordained to be witnesses 
of his resurrection, and the first preachers of his gospel ; for 
the apostles, or wise men here spoken of, were such as in 
former ages had been killed by the Jews, Matt, xxiii. 35, 
and they are called airoaToXoi, from cnroaTE\\(v, mitto, only as 
being sent from God : as it is afterwards expressed, " O 
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and 
stonest, roue aTreaTaXfiEvovg npog aurrjv, persons whom God 
hath sent;" ver. 37. The difference between prophets and wise 
men, in those passages, is, probably, that the former spoke, 
sometimes, at least, by inspiration, and occasionally pre- 
dicted things to come ; the latter were uninspired preachers, 
well skilled in the Scriptures, and sent of God by a provi- 
dential mission, as ordinary ministers now are. 

In the First Epistle to the Corinthians, the apostle seems to 
speak of certain wise men with some degree of contempt : 
" Where is the wise ? Where is the scribe ? Where is the dis- 
puter of this world ? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom 
of this world?" Chap. i. 20. But perhaps he here refers, 
not to the Jewish D^DDIl chachamim, but to the Gentile phi- 
losophers, who, as Godwin observes, affected to be called 
ao(j>oi, till Pythagoras introduced the more modest title <pi\o- 
(toQol. There is no great reason to doubt that this was his 
meaning, because the wisdom of the wise, ver. 19, of which 
he spoke just before, signifies the wisdom of the heathen 
world, by which, as he afterward declares, they knew not 
God, ver. 21 ; which was true, not of the Jews, but only of 
the Gentiles : and these Grecian aotyoi were the persons to 
whom the preaching of Christ crucified was foolishness; 
ver. 23. Again, when the same apostle says, that he is a 
debtor, aotyoiq re mi avoijroic, Rom. i. 14, he means the 
learned and unlearned, to the philosophers and common 
people. 

It is farther observed, that the title DDn chacham, with the 
Jews, and <to$oc, with the Gentiles, were given to such as 



266 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book r. 



were skilful in manual arts. Homer accounts such to be 
taught by Minerva, the goddess of w 7 isdom. 

TiKTOVOQ ev 7ra\afjLr](n Saijfiovog, og pa rt -nanr^g 
Ev udt] cro<piT)s v7To6t)ijlo<tvve<tiv AOrjvrjg. 

Iliad, xv. 1. 411. 

And to this some think the apostle alludes, when he com- 
pares himself to a ao<pog apxiTSKTwv, a wise master-builder; 
1 Cor. iii. 10. 

Of the Scribes. 

The Hebrew word "IDD sopher, which we render Scribe, is 
derived from the root 1DP saphar, numeravit, from whence, I 
suppose, comes the English word cypher ; or from the noun 
-)DD sepher, enumeratio, or liber, just as the Latin Hbrarius 
and libellarius are derived from liber. Accordingly, the Tar- 
gum renders *>1DO sophere by \^blb labhlarin, Esther iii. 12: 
chap. viii. 9 ; a word which, as well as many others in the 
Chaldee and Syriac tongues, is evidently of Latin original. 
The Septuagint renders "iDD sopher, by ypa/m/uarEvg, from 
ypcififia, liter a. 

The Scribes, therefore, according to the etymological mean- 
ing of the term, were persons some way employed about 
books, writings, numbers, or accounts, in transcribing, reading, 
explaining, Sic. Now, according to these various employ- 
ments, there were several sorts of Scribes. However, most 
authors reduce them to tw r o general heads, or classes, civil 
and ecclesiastical Scribes. As the word pD cohbi, which in 
general signifies an immediate attendant on a king, is applied 
either to nobles in the courts of earthly princes, or to the 
priests who attended the service of God the King of Israel 
in his temple ; so is the word Scribe applied, both to those 
persons who were employed about any kind of civil writings 
or records, and to such as addicted themselves to studying, 
transcribing, and explaining the holy Scriptures. Of the civil 
Scribes there were doubtless various ranks and degrees, from 
the common scrivener to the principal secretary of state, in 
which office we find Seraiah, in the reign of king David, who 
is ranked with the chief officers of the kingdom, 2 Sam. viii. 



CHAP. Vl.j 



OF THE SCRIBES. 



267 



17; Shebna, in the reign of Hezekiah, 2 Kings xviii. 18; 
Shaphan, in the reign of Josiah, chap. xxii. 3; Elishama, 
in the reign of Jehoiakim, who is numbered among the 
princes; Jer. xxxvi. 12. It is probable the next Scribe in 
office to the principal secretary of state, was the secretary of 
war, called the " principal Scribe of the host, who mustered 
the people of the land;" 2 Kings xxv. 19. It is reasonably 
supposed this is the officer referred to in the following passage 
of Isaiah : " Where is the Scribe ? Where is the receiver ? 
Where is he that counteth the towers?" Chap, xxxiii. 18. Which 
both Grotius and Lowth understand to be spoken in a way of 
triumph over the king of Assyria, whose defeat the prophet 
had just before predicted ; whereupon the Israelites should 
reflect with pleasure on the dangers they had escaped, and in 
a triumphant manner inquire, Where is now the Scribe, or 
muster-master of the host, who threatened our destruction ? 
Where is the receiver, or collector of those oppressive taxes, 
that were imposed on us by the enemy ? And where is he 
that counted the towers? — meaning, it is likely, the chief 
engineer of the army, or master of the artillery and am- 
munition. 

But besides these principal Scribes or secretaries, we read 
of numbers of a lower order, as of the " families of the Scribes 
which dwelt at Jabez," 1 Chron. ii. 55, and of the Scribes, as 
well as the officers and porters, that were of the tribe of 
Levi ; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 13. It is probable some of these were 
under-secretaries and clerks to the principal Scribes, like the 
Scribes of king Ahasuerus before mentioned ; others of them 
might be scriveners employed in drawing deeds, contracts, &c; 
or in writing letters, and any other business of penmanship ; 
like Baruch, the Scribe, who wrote Jeremiah's prophecy from 
his mouth, Jer. xxxvi. 4 and 32, and who had probably been 
before employed by Jeremiah to draw the deed of the purchase 
of the field, which he bought of his uncle's son ; chap, xxxii. 
12 — 14. Such Scribes are referred to in the forty-fifth Psalm : 
" My tongue is as the pen of a ready Scribe ;" Psalm, xlv. 1 . 

It is not unlikely, that others of these inferior Scribes might 
be schoolmasters, who, as the Jewish doctors tell us, were 
chiefly of the tribe of Simeon; and that Jacob's prophetic 
curse upon this tribe, " that they should be divided in Jacob, 



268 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



and scattered in Israel/'* was hereby accomplished. How- 
ever, we have no evidence of this in Scripture, which gives us 
another clear account of the fulfilment of that prophecy, first, 
by an inheritance being assigned that tribe, upon the original 
division of the land of Canaan, within the inheritance of the 
children of Judah, Josh. xix. 1; and afterward, when that 
tribe was increased, in Hezekiah's time, by their being obliged 
to seek out new settlements for a part of it at Gedor, and at 
Mount Seir; 1 Chron. iv. 39, et seq. We come now to 
treat, 

2dly. Of the ecclesiastical Scribes, who are frequently men- 
tioned in the New Testament. According to Lightfoot, these 
were the learned of the nation, who expounded the law, and 
taught it to the people,t and they are, therefore, sometimes 
called vojuoSiSatfKaXot, " doctors of the law;" for those 
who, in the fifth chapter of St. Luke, are styled Pharisees 
and doctors of the law, ver. 17, are soon afterward called 
Pharisees and Scribes, ver. 21. And that the vo/llikoi, so 
often mentioned in the New Testament, and rendered lawyers, 
were no other than Scribes, appears from hence, that he who, 
in the twenty-second of St. Matthew ver. 35, is called vo/iiKog, 
a lawyer, is said in the twelfth of St. Mark, ver. 28, to be tig 
twv ypamicLTzuv, one of the Scribes. Nevertheless, Dru- 
sius,J Trigland,^ Camero,|| and some others, conceive there 
must have been some distinction between the Scribes and the 
lawyers; because when our Saviour had reproached the 
Scribes and Pharisees with their hypocrisy, Luke xi. 44, it is 
added, that " one of the lawyers answered, and said unto 
him, Master, thus saying thou reproachest us also/' How- 
ever, the elder Spanheim imagines, that this passage rather 
proves the lawyers and the Scribes to have been the same, 
than the contrary; for he observes, that our Saviour having, 

* Gen. xlix. 7. See the Jerusalem Targum in loc.; R. Solomon, as 
quoted by Christoph. Cartwright (Elect. Targumico-Rabbin. in loc.), saith, 
" Non sunt tibi pauperes scribae, et pcedagogi, nisi ex Simeone, ut essent 
dispersi." 

f Horse Hebr. Luc. x. 25. 

X Drusius de Tribus Sectis Judaeor. lib. ii. cap. xiii. edit. Trigland. torn, 
i. p. 249. 

§ Triglandii Diatribe de Secta Karaeor. cap. vi. p. 58, et seq. 
|| Camer. Annot. in Matt, xxii. 32, apud Criticos Sacros. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE SGRIBES. 



269 



in his preceding discourse, ver. 39, et seq., only reproached 
the Pharisees, and denounced woes upon them, at length, 
ver. 44, joins the Scribes with them : " Woe unto you, Scribes 
and Pharisees, hypocrites," &c. Immediately upon which, 
the lawyer takes fire, and resents his reproaching them also, 
them as well as the Pharisees ; from whence it appears, the 
lawyers, otherwise called Scribes, were the persons here in- 
tended. Accordingly, the Syriac version, Luke xi. 45, ren- 
ders vofiLKOQ, N"iDD sophere, Scribe. # 

That Scribe was a general name or title of all who studied 
and were teachers of the law and of religion at the time of 
writing the Targum, appears from its calling the prophets 
several times Scribes ; as in the First Book of Samuel it is said 
concerning Saul, that " a company of Scribes met him ; and 
they saw that he was prophesying among the Scribes :" and 
they said, " Is Saul also among the Scribes?" chap. x. 10, 
11. Again, in the prophecy of Isaiah, " The Scribe that 
teacheth lies, he is the tail chap. ix. 15. 

Scribe, then, is not the name of a sect, as Godwin seems 
to imagine, but, as Casaubonf shows, of an office ; nor is it 
true what the former saith, that the Scribes, cleaving to the 
written word more than the Pharisees, who adhered to the 
traditions, were from thence called textmen. He confounds 
the Scribes with the Karaites, a sect that adhered to the writ- 
ten Scriptures, and rejected all traditions. The Scribes, for the 
most part, were Pharisees, the most popular and flourishing 
sect among the Jews, and they are therefore censured by our 
Saviour along with them, for burdening the people with their 
traditionary precepts ; Matt, xxiii. 2. 4. There is mention in- 
deed, in the Acts, of the " Scribes that were of the Phari- 
sees' part," chap, xxiii. 9, in the contention between them and 
the Sadducees, as if they were some other sect distinct from 
the Pharisees, who joined them on this occasion. But 
6t ypafifiarsig rov fuLtpovg rcvv Qapiaaiiiyv may be rendered, agree- 
able to the Syriac version, the Scribes who were of the Pha- 

* Vid. Spanheim. Dubia Evangel, part ii. Dub. xxxviii. xxxix. xl. 
sect. vii. p. 398, 399, edit. Genev. 1658. 

f Casaubon. Exercitat. in Baron, annal. exerc. i. apparat. viii. p. 52, 53, 
edit, Genev. 1655. 



270 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



risees' party or sect ; and who, being the more learned persons 
of the party, undertook to dispute against the Sadducees. 

Upon the whole, the Scribes were the preaching clergy 
among the Jews, and whilst the priests attended the sacrifices, 
they instructed the people. It was on account of their sup- 
posed skill in the Scriptures, that, when Herod was anxious 
to know, where, according to the prophecies, the Messiah 
should be born, he " gathered all the chief priests and Scribes 
of the people together," to obtain information ; Matt. ii. 4. 

Joseph Scaliger endeavours to establish a distinction be- 
tween the ypajufiaTEig tov Xaov, the Scribes of the people, as 
they are here called, and the ypafipaTug tov vopov, the Scribes of 
the law. The former he makes to be a sort of public notaries, 
whose employment was in secular business ; the latter, preachers 
and expounders of the law. # But besides that we no where 
meet in Scripture with the phrase ypappareig tov vopov, the 
Scribes of the law% it is evident, that the ypappaTug tov Xaov, 
the Scribes of the people, whom Herod consulted, were applied 
to on account of their skill in explaining Scripture prophecies. 
And they seem to have been in considerable reputation for 
their skill in this respect, which is intimated in the question 
that the disciples put to Christ, " Why then say the Scribes, 
that Elias must first come ?" Matt. xvii. 10. They were pro- 
bably called Scribes of the people, because they were their 
stated and ordinary teachers. And their being, in virtue of 
their office, public speakers, is the reason, I suppose, that 
the officers DniDit' shoterim, mentioned in the book of Deu- 
teronomy, who were to speak to the people, chap. xx. 5. 9, 
are in the Samaritan version styled DnDD sopheiim, and in the 
Septuagint, ypap.iio.Tug, or Scribes. That they were, generally, 
at least, public preachers, may be inferred from its being said, 
that Christ " taught as one having authority, and not as the 
Scribes;" Mark i. 22. This assertion gives occasion to Dr. 
Lightfoot to observe three heads of difference between the 
teaching of the Scribes and that of Christ : 

1st. They taught chiefly the traditions of the fathers ; our 
Saviour, the sound and self-grounded word of God. And 
when he bade his disciples call no man father upon earth, he 
* Scaliger. Elench. Trihaeres, cap. xi. p. 404, edit. Trigland. 



r n A P . Vt .] 



OF THE SCRIBES. 



271 



meant it in opposition to the vain traditions which the Scribes 
taught, namely, the traditions of the fathers. 

2dly. The teaching of the Scribes was especially about ex- 
ternal, carnal, and trivial rites ; as that they should wash their 
hands before eating, and the like, Matt. xv. 1, 2; whereas 
Christ taught the spiritual and weighty doctrines of faith, re- 
pentance, renovation, charity, &c. 

3dly. The teaching of the Scribes was litigious : they toiled 
in intricate and endless disputes, and were therefore probably 
the preachers to whom the apostle refers, in the sixth chapter 
of the First Epistle to Timothy, whom he describes as con- 
ceited and ignorant, doting about questions and strife of words, 
from whence proceed envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, 
perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, &c. ver. 3 — 5; 
whereas our Saviour's preaching was plain and convincing.* 

We have a farther intimation, concerning the manner of 
their teaching in our Saviour's time, in the eleventh chapter 
of St. Luke, ver. 52, where, instead of leading the people into 
an acquaintance with true religion, they are charged with 
taking away the key of knowledge, by leading them off from 
attending to the Scriptures, by insisting so much on traditions, 
and especially by the false interpretations of the prophecies 
relating to the Messiah, whereby the people were kept from 
believing on him now he was actually come. 

Camero observes, that a key was delivered to each Scribe, 
as a badge of his office, when he first entered upon it ; to 
which perhaps our Saviour here alludes. f 

Spanheim farther remarks,;}; that what is here charged upon 
the lawyers, is elsewhere charged upon the Scribes, Matt, xxiii. 
13 ; which is a farther evidence, that the lawyers and the 
Scribes were the same. Nevertheless, he is ready to admit, 
that the lawyers might be a superior sort of Scribes ; yet all 
the Scribes might not be lawyers. 

That there were different ranks and degrees of these Scribes 
is inferred from the sixth chapter of the Second Book of Mac- 
cabees, ver. 18, where Eleazar is said to be rig rwv irptvTevovrow 
ypa/uLfxarEwv, " one of the principal Scribes." Such a one was 

* Harmony on Mark i. 22. 

f Camer. in Luc. xi. 52, apud Criticos Sacros. 

I Spanheim, ubi supra. 



272 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



Gamaliel ; Acts v. 34. Josephus also speaks of hpoypaiifiaTUQ, 
sacred Scribes, # who judged of the signs which portended the 
destruction of Jerusalem ; they were probably of superior dig- 
nity, and, as their name seems to import, priests as well as 
Scribes. 

However, notwithstanding the corrupt doctrine and instruc- 
tions which the Scribes delivered in their public teaching, they 
are said to sit in Moses's seat, and our Saviour charges his 
disciples to observe and do whatever they bid them do; Matt, 
xxiii. 2, 3. By Moses's seat, Dr. Lightfoot understands the 
seat of judicature, as they were members of the Sanhedrim ;f 
but the advice which Christ gives to observe and do what 
they directed or commanded, or to follow their good instruc- 
tions in opposition to their bad example, ver. 3, evidently 
refers to their teaching rather than to their judging. It is 
therefore a more probable conjecture, that Moses's seat here 
means the chair or pulpit, out of which the Scribes, in the 
synagogues, used to deliver their discourses sitting, as the 
custom then was, Matt. v. 1, 2; though we read, that, in 
former times, Ezra stood upon a pulpit of wood, when he read 
and explained the law to the people ; Nehem. viii. 4. It was 
called the chair or seat of Moses, probably because the books 
of Moses were read and explained from it. Now, as for our 
Saviour's charging his disciples to do and observe whatsoever 
these corrupt preachers bid them, it must certainly be under- 
stood only so far as they sat in the chair of Moses, or de- 
livered the dictates of the law ; for if he had required of his 
disciples an absolute submission to their dictates, he would in 
effect have forbid their believing in himself, whom the Scribes 
rejected. 

Though the Pharisees are continually joined with the Scribes, 
particularly in the passage we have been just considering, 
where " the Scribes and the Pharisees are said to sit in Moses's 
seat;" we have, however, no reason to think any of the Pha- 
risees were public preachers by office, except those who were 
Scribes. But the true account of this phrase, Scribes and Pha- 
risees, is, I apprehend, either that it means Scribes who were 
Pharisees, or Pharisaical Scribes, the Scribes being generally 

* Joseph, de Bell. Judaic, lib. vi. cap. v. sect. iii. p. 388, edit. Haverc. 
f Lightfoot, Horse Hebr. in loc. 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE MASORITES} 



273 



of that sect ; or else it might be common for those Pharisees 
who were not Scribes, to teach the people occasionally, though 
they were in no ecclesiastical office; as other laymen were 
allowed to do. Thus Christ, who was certainly in no eccle- 
siastical office among the Jews, " went about Galilee teaching 
in their synagogues," Matt. iv. 23 ; and Paul, with the leave 
of the rulsi, preached in the synagogue at Antioch; Actsxiii. 
15, 16. But this we shall have occasion to consider more 
particularly, when we treat concerning the synagogues. 

The Scribes appear to have been men of great power and 
authority in the state; Matt. xx. 18. For it is predicted of 
them, and of the chief priests, that they should condemn our 
Saviour to death. But I do not apprehend, that this was in 
virtue of their office as Scribes, but partly by reason of their 
influence as public preachers, and partly as many of them 
were members of the Sanhedrim, which was then the supreme 
court of judicature. 

As for the origin of this office, some make it to be as 
ancient as Ezra, who is said to be a ready Scribe in the law of 
Moses ; chap. vii. 6. But his being called a Scribe, which was 
a general title given to men of literature, as has been shown 
before, will not prove the office of ecclesiastical Scribes, such 
as we find in our Saviour's time, to have been of so high 
antiquity. It is most likely, that it grew up by degrees, after 
the spirit of prophecy ceased from among the Jews ; for when 
they had no prophet to apply to in any doubt about doctrine 
or worship, they fell into disputes, and split into sects and 
parties; which made a set of men necessary, whose proper 
business it should be to apply themselves to the study of the 
law, in order to explain and teach it to the people.* 

Of the Masorites. 

Before we dismiss the Scribes, it will be proper to say 
something of the Masorets, or Masorites, who were a lower 
sort of Scribes. Their profession was to write out copies of 
the Hebrew Scriptures; to teach the true reading of them, 

* See on this subject, Spanheim, Dubia Evang. part. ii. dub. xxxviii, xl, 

p. 392 — 405; Leusden, Philolog. Hebrseo-Mixt. dissert, xxiii, 

T 



274 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



and criticise upon them. Their work is called Masora, from 
")DD masar, tradidit, because, say the Jews, when God gave 
the law to Moses at Mount Sinai, he taught him first, the true 
reading of it, and secondly, its true interpretation; and that 
both these were handed down by oral tradition, from gene- 
ration to generation, till at length they were committed to 
writing. # The former of these, namely, the true reading, is 
the subject of the Masora; the latter, or true interpretation, 
of the Mishna and Gemara, which we shall give you an ac- 
count of in another place. 

The age when the Masorites first rose is somewhat doubt- 
ful. Archbishop Usher places them before Jerome; Capel, 
at the end of the fifth century .f Father Morin asserts the 
Masorites did not appear till the tenth century. Elias Levita, 
a Jew, who bestowed twenty years' labour on explaining the 
Masora, makes the first compilers of it to be the Jews of the 
famous school of Tiberias, about five hundred years after 
Christ; J Basnage says, that we seek in vain for the time of 
the Masorites ; since they were not a society, nor even a suc- 
cession of men, who applied themselves to this study for a 
certain number of years, and afterward disappeared; but the 
Masora is the work of a great number of grammarians, who, 
without associating and communicating their notions, com- 
posed this collection of criticisms on the Hebrew text.§ 
However, if, according to Elias Levita, the school of Tiberias 
first gathered them into one volume, and so properly begun 

* Mishn. tit. Pirke Abhoth, cap. i.; et Maimon. in praefat. ad Jad Cha- 
zakah : Prsecepta, que Mosi tradita sunt in Sinai, ea omnia data sunt cum 
expositione sua, juxta illud Exod. xxiv. 12. " Et dabo tibi tabulas lapideas, 
et legem, et mandatum," &c. legem sc. scriptam ; et mandatum, id est, ex- 
positionem ejus. See the passage at large, in De Voisin's Observat. ad 
Pugionem Fidei, p. 9. Elias Levita asserts, that the Masora was handed 
down in like manner from Moses, till it was reduced to writing, as he saith, 
by the doctors of the school of Tiberias. — Elias Levita in praef. lib. iii. Ma- 
soreth hamasoreth. See also the book Cozri, p. 199, edit. Buxtorf. 1660. 

f Capelli Critic. Sacr. lib. vi. cap. iv. p. 391. 

J Elias Levita, ubi supra. 

§ Basnage, in his History of the Jews, book iii. chap. ix. sect. vii. p. 182, 
mentions the opinions of Usher and Morin, as well as of Capel and Levita, 
but endeavours to prove, sect, ix., that Ben-Asher and Ben-Naphtali, about 
the year 1030, were the true inventors of the Masora. 



CHAP. VI.] OF THE MASORITES, 275 

the work which is now called the Masora, of which there is 
both a greater and a less, printed at Venice and at Basil, it 
Jiath nevertheless been enlarged since the time of that school ; 
for there were Masorites long afterward, even as late as 
about A. D. 1030; particularly Ben-Asher and Ben-Naph- 
tali, who were very famous, and the last of the profession. 
Each of these published a copy of the whole Hebrew text, as 
correct, saith Dr. Prideaux, as they could make it. The 
eastern Jews have followed that of Ben-Naphtali, and the 
western that of Ben-Asher; and all that has been done since 
is to copy after them, without making any more corrections, 
or masoretical criticisms.* 

Their work regards merely the letter of the Hebrew text : 
in which they have, first, fixed the true reading by vowels and 
accents ; though whether these points were originally annexed 
to the Hebrew letters by them, is a matter of dispute, which 
we shall consider in another place. 

They have, secondly, numbered not only the chapters and 
sections, but the verses, words, and letters of the text. They 
find, accordingly, in the Pentateuch 5245 verses, and in the 
whole Bible 23,206. Some indeed have doubted, whether 
they carried their diligence so far as to number the letters. 
But Father Simon attests that he had seen a MS. Masora, 
which numbered in the book of Genesis 12 great sections, 
43 sedarim, or orders, 1534 verses, 20,713 words, and 78,100 
letters .f The Masora is therefore called by the Jews, the 
hedge or fence of the law; inasmuch as this numbering the 
verses, words, and letters, is a means of preserving it from 
being altered and corrupted. Thus it is said in the Mishna, 
that tithes are the fences of riches, vows are the fences of 
sanctity, silence is the fence of wisdom, and the Masora is the 
fence of the law. J Hence, also, Aben-Ezra calls the Maso- 
rites the keepers of the walls of the holy city.§ 

* Prideaux's Connect, part i. book v. vol. ii. p. 516, edit. 10. 
f Vid. Simon. Histr. Critic. Vet. Test. lib. i. cap. xxvi. p. 128, Paris, 
1681. 

% Pirke Abhoth, cap. iii. sect. xiii. torn. iv. p. 442, edit. Surenhus. 
§ Aben-Ezra, quoted by Carpzovius, Critic. Sacr. part i. cap. vi. p. 288, 
Lipsiae, 1728. 

T 2 



276 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



They have, thirdly, marked whatever irregularities are found 
in any of the letters of the Hebrew text; as that in some 
words one letter is of a larger (vid. Deut. vi. 4), in others, of 
a less (vid. Gen. ii. 4) size, than the rest. Of the former 
sort they discover thirty-one instances ; of the latter, thirty- 
three. They observe four words in which one letter is sus- 
pended, or placed somewhat higher than the rest (vid. Judges 
xviii. 30) ; nine places, in which the letter nun is inverted (vid. 
Numb. x. 35); and several places where the final letters are 
not used at the end of words; and others, where they are 
used in the middle. 

They are likewise very fruitful in finding out reasons for 
these irregularities, and mysteries in them. Thus the great 
van in the word, pnj gachon, in the forty-second verse of the 
eleventh chapter of Leviticus, is to signify, that it is just the 
middle of the Pentateuch. The last letter both of the first 
and last word of this sentence in the sixth chapter of Deu- 
teronomy, ver. 4, " Hear, O Israel, the Lord thy God is one 
Lord," is of an extraordinary size, in order to denote the ex- 
traordinary weight of that sentence, and the peculiar attention 
it deserves. The caph in the word nrD3^ libhchothah, in the 
second verse of the twenty-third chapter of Genesis, where 
Abraham is said to weep for Sarah, is of a lesser size, to 
signify the moderation of his mourning, she being an old 
woman. 

They are, fourthly, supposed to be the authors of the keri 
and chethibh, or the marginal corrections of the text in our 
Hebrew Bibles ; among which they have noted transpositions 
of letters in some words, as "irQ* jebuchar, for -\2il*>jechubar, 
in the ninth chapter of Ecclesiastes, and the fourth verse ; and 
one word put for another, as ^11 ubeut for pi uben, in the 
forty-sixth chapter of Genesis, and the twenty-third verse. 
But we shall have occasion to take farther notice of the keri 
and chethibh, when we come to treat of the Hebrew lan- 
guage. 

From this short specimen of the works of the Masorites, 
you will probably conceive a higher opinion of their industry 
and diligence than of their judgment. As for the irregulari- 
ties in the letters, upon which they have commented, it being 



CHAP. VI.] 



OF THE MASORITES. 



277 



reasonable to suppose that these happened at first by mere 
accident in transcribing, they would have discovered more 
good sense if they had corrected them, than in devising 
reasons for them, and assigning mystical interpretations to 
them. 

Dr. Prideaux saith, those who were the authors of the 
Masora now extant, were a monstrous trifling set of men, 
whose criticisms and observations went no higher than number- 
ing the verses, words, and letters, of every book in the He- 
brew Bible, marking which was the middle word, verse, or 
letter, in each of them, and making of such other poor and 
low remarks concerning them, as are not worth reading or 
regarding, whatever Richard Simon the Frenchman may say 
to the contrary. * 

The D*3trm durshanim, whom Godwin supposes to be in- 
tended by the disputers of this world, mentioned in the first 
chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, ver. 20, were 
likewise a sort of Scribes or doctors of the law. There was a 
threefold exposition of the law in vogue among the Jews, in 
their later and corrupt ages ; the first, a literal explication of 
the written law, which they called *opD mikra; the second, 
consisting of the traditions of the fathers, styled the mttfo 
mishna, with a comment upon them styled the mDJ gemara, 
both together called the talmud; the third, a mystic and 
allegorical exposition of the Scriptures, called timo midrash, 
or commentary kclt a^ox^v.f The apostle's allegory of Sara 
and Hagar, with their sons, by which he illustrates the two 
covenants, in the Epistle to the Galatians, chap, iv., is some- 
what in this style, and was, therefore, admirably suited to the 
taste of the persons whom he is there addressing. 

The Cabalists likewise were a sort of mystical doctors, who 
discovered a world of mystery in the letters of the sacred text, 
either by considering their numeral power, or by changing 
and transposing them in different ways, according to the rules 
of their art. By these means they extracted senses from the 

* See Prideaux's Connect, part i. book v. sub anno 446. For a larger 
account of the Masorites and their works, consult, besides the authors al- 
ready quoted, Buxtorfii Tiberias; Carpzovii Critica Sacra, parti, cap- vi. ; 
and Walton. Prolegom. viii. ad Bibl. Polyglot. 

f Vid. Lightfoot. Hoi\ Hebraic, in Luc, x, 25. 



278 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



sacred oracles, very different from those which the expression 
seemed naturally to import, or which were ever intended by 
the authors. # 

We have before offered some reasons for believing that by 
the (TO(j>og, mentioned in the first chapter of the First Epistle 
to the Corinthians, ver. 20, are meant Gentile philosophers, 
and not, as Godwin seems to imagine, Jewish teachers of tra- 
ditions. Whether the disputer of this world, avX,^rr\rx\q tov 
mwvog tovtov, referred to the Jewish allegorical doctors, or 
the Gentile natural philosophers, as distinguished from the 
moral philosophers, called oofyoi, is differently conjectured by 
the learned, but very hard to be determined with certainty. 

* A large account of the cabalistic art, as practised, not only by Jews, 
but by heathens and Christians, may be seen in Basnage's History of the 
Jews, book iii. chap. x. — xxviii. 



CHAPTER VII. 



OF THE TITLE RABBI. 

The title Rabbi, with several others from the same root, 
nni rabhabh, magnus est, ml multiplicatus est, began first to 
be assumed, according to Godwin, as a distinguishing title of 
honour by men of learning, about the time of the birth of 
Christ. We find it anciently given, indeed, to several magis- 
trates and officers of state. In the Book of Esther, it is said, 
the king appointed lno Zl-bl col-rab betho, which we render 
" all the officers of his house ;" chap. i. 8. In Jeremiah we 
read of the "j^Dn *m rabbe hammelek, " the princes of the 
king chap. xli. L In the Book of Job, it is said, that the 
Don rabbim, which we render *' great men, are not always 
wise," chap, xxxii. 9 Engl., 10 Heb. ; a rendering, which I ap- 
prehend well expresses the original meaning of the word. It 
was not therefore in those days properly a title of honour, be- 
longing to any particular office or dignity, in church or state ; 
but all who were of superior rank and condition in life, were 
called D<on rabbim. We do not find the prophets, or other 
men of learning in the Old Testament, affecting any title be- 
side that which denoted their office ; and they were contented 
to be addressed by their bare names. But as religion and 
true knowledge declined among them, their pride discovered 
itself in affectation of titles of honour. Thus, in the first ages 
of the Christian church, during the prevalence of truth, and 
of piety and humility, the ministers of Christ had no other 
titles, but the mere names of their office, apostles, pastors, 
&c, whereas, in the later corrupt ages of ignorance and pride, 
a number of titles of honour were invented, to support their 
dignity, and conciliate the respect and reverence of the peo- 
ple ; as masters, doctors, &c. 

The first Jewish rabbi, said to have been distinguished with 
any title of honour, was Simeon, the son of Hillel, who suc- 
ceeded his father as president of the Sanhedrim ; and his title 



280 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



was that of Rabban.* He is supposed by Altingius to have 
been the Simeon who took the infant Jesus in his arms, and 
blessed him, Luke ii. 25 ; and for this reason, as he conceives, 
he is seldom mentioned by the later rabbies, though he was a 
man of such honour and dignity, and the first who was dis- 
tinguished by their favourite title. f Others think it hardly 
probable, that the Simeon who was directed by the Holy 
Ghost to pay that respect to our Saviour, was the president 
of the Sanhedrim ; for Gamaliel, the president's son, was 
tutor to St. Paul, who received no favourable notion of Chris- 
tianity from him, as in all probability he must have done from 
the son of that Simeon who took our Saviour in his arms and 
blessed him. Besides, had he, who did this, been president 
of the great council, St. Luke in all likelihood would have 
taken notice of so extraordinary a circumstance, instead of 
mentioning him only as " a certain man in Jerusalem, whose 
name was Simeon. "J 

The later rabbies tell us, this title was conferred with a 
good deal of ceremony. When a person had gone through 
the schools, and was thought worthy of the degree of rabbi, he 
was first placed in a chair somewhat raised above the company ; 
then were delivered to him a key and a table-book : the key, 
as a symbol of the power or authority now conferred upon him, 
to teach that knowledge to others, which he had learned himself ; 
and this key he afterward wore as a badge of his honour, 
and when he died, it was buried with him: the table-book 
was a symbol of his diligence in his studies, and of his en- 
deavouring to make farther improvements in learning. 

The third ceremony in the creation of a rabbi was the im- 
position of hands on him by the delegates of the Sanhedrim, 
practised in imitation of Moses's§ ordaining Joshua by this 
rite, to succeed him in his office : Numb, xxvii. 18 ; Deut. 
xxxiv. 9. And then, 

* Lightfoot's Harmony on Luke ii. 25. 

f Alting. de Schilo, lib. iv. xxi. torn. v. Oper. p. 99; Lightfoot, ubi supra ; 
and Horse Hebr. Luke ii. 25. 

X See Witsii Miscell. torn. i. lib. i. cap. xxi. sect. xiii. — xvi. p. 289 — 292, 
edit. Traject. 1692. 

§ Maimon. Tractat. Sanhedrin, cap. iv. ; vid. Selden de Synedr. lib. i. 
cap. xiv. Opera, vol. i.tom. ii, p. 1088, 1089. 



CHAP. VII.] 



OF THE TITLE RABBI. 



281 



Fourthly, they proclaimed his title.* 

According to Maimonides, the third ceremony was not 
looked upon to be essential; but was sometimes omitted. 
They did not always, saith he, lay their hands on the head of 
the elder to be ordained ; but called him rabbi, and said, Be- 
hold thou art ordained, and hast power, &c.+ 

We find this title given to John the Baptist, John iii. 26; 
and frequently to our blessed Saviour ; as by John's disciples, 
John i. 38, by Nicodemus, chap. iii. 2, and by the people that 
followed him; chap. vi. 25. 

It has been made a question, whether our Lord had taken 
the degree and title of rabbi in the Jewish schools. Vitringa 
maintains the affirmative,! alleging that he was called so by 
Judas, Matt. xxvi. 25, who he supposes would not have com- 
plimented him with a title, to which he had no right. It may 
be replied, that this being before Judas discovered his trea- 
son, and while he associated with the disciples, he no doubt 
affected to speak as respectfully to Christ, as any of the rest. 

Vitringa insists upon another argument, to prove that 
Christ must have taken the degree of rabbi; alleging, that 
otherwise he could not have preached publicly in the temple, 
and in the synagogues, as we know he did. But this is built 
on a mistake in fact. Any Israelite might preach publicly in 
the temple, or in the synagogue, by the permission of the ruler 
of it, as we observed in a former lecture. § 

Mr. Selden takes the other side of the questional denying 
that Christ had ever taken this degree. And for this opinion 
several arguments may be alleged. 

1st. It appears that he had had no education in the rab- 
binical schools, as those who were honoured with this degree 
must have had; John vii. 15. 

2dly. He expresses his disapprobation of the title, and 
charges his disciples not to assume it, Matt, xxiii. 7, 8: " Be 

* See, on the creation of a rabbi, Alting. in Oratione de Promot. Hebr. 
f Maimon. Sanhedr. cap. iv.; see Selden, ubi supra, and Lightfoot's Hor. 
Hebr. Acts xiii. 3. 

X Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, vol. ii. lib. iii. part i. cap. vii. p. 706, 707. 
§ See above, p. 273. 

|| Selden, de Synedr. Hebrseor. lib. ii. cap. vii. sect. viii. Opera, vol. i. 
torn. ii. p. 1373. 



282 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



not ye called rabbi," &c. Which, as Mr. Selden shows, was 
a prohibition of their taking that degree ; but was not intended 
absolutely to condemn the use of the title as a mark of civility 
to those public teachers who might not in form have taken 
the degree; a practice, at that time, common among the 
Jews, as giving the title of doctor to the minister of the parish, 
whether he hath taken the degree or not, is now among us.* 

The reason of our Lord's forbidding his disciples to be 
called, or to affect the title of rabbi, was, doubtless, 

1st. To caution them against that pride and haughtiness 
which generally went along with it. For, though the rabbies 
pretended to slight the honour, and it was a maxim with them, 
" Love the work and not the title ;"f it is certain, neverthe- 
less, they were excessively proud and vain of it, insomuch that 
they were highly offended, if any person spoke to them with- 
out giving it to them ; a remarkable instance of which Wagen- 
seil relates :J " A certain rabbi sent a letter to another, and 
forgot to give him his title ; but only called him in plain terms, 
friend. At which he was so highly incensed, that he imme- 
diately sent a messenger to that rabbi, charging him to call 
him Anan, Anan (which was his name), without giving him 
the title rabbi." This, it seems, was the keenest revenge he 
could take on him for so gross an affront. And Dr. Light- 
foot tells us, from one of their rabbinical books, that the San- 
hedrim excommunicated certain persons twenty-four times for 
not giving due honour to the rabbies. § 

2dly. The design of our Saviour's forbidding his disciples 
to be called rabbi was probably also, that they might not take 
upon them to lord it over the faith and consciences of men, 
as the rabbies did, who pretended to little less than to be in- 
fallible guides of faith and conscience ; insomuch that it was 
looked upon as a crime for any person not to hearken to the 
rabbies, or to disbelieve or doubt of the truth of what they 

* Selden. de Synedr. lib. ii. cap. vii. sect. x. Opera, vol. i. torn. ii. p. 
1378—1383. 

f See Maimonides as quoted by Lightfoot, Hor. Hebraic. Matt, xxiii. 7 ; 
and Pyrke Abhoth, lib. i. cap. x. ; et Ob. de Bartenora in loc. 

t Wagenseil in Sota, annot. v. in cap. i. sect. x. except. Gemarae, p. 
109. 

§ Horse Hebraic. Matt, xxiii. 7. 



CHAP. VII.] OF THE TITLE RABBI. 



283 



taught. Hence Gamaliel advises the ignorant among the 
Jews " to get themselves rabbies, that they may no longer 
doubt of any thing;"* and Rabbi Eleazar says, " he that 
separates from the school of the rabbies, or teaches any thing 
which he has not heard from his master, provokes the Divine 
Majesty to depart from Israel."f 

Maimonides tells us, that men of the degree of rabbi were 
also called Abba, or father ; and that " he who will be holy, 
must perform the words of the fathers." J Hence our Saviour 
forbids his disciples taking the title of father as well as rabbi ; 
Matt, xxiii. 8, 9. 

These are the teachers and guides to whom the apostle 
seems to refer, when he saith, Rom. ii. 17 — 20, "Behold 
thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy 
boast of God, and knowest his will, and approvest the things 
that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law ; and 
art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light 
of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, 
a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of 
the truth in the law."§ 

The reason of our Saviour's prohibiting his disciples to be 
called rabbi is expressed in these words, " Be not ye called 
rabbi, for one is your master, even Christ," Ka^r)yr\Tr\g, your 
guide and conductor, on whose word and instructions alone 
you are to depend in matters of religion and salvation. Ac- 
cordingly the inspired apostles pretend to nothing more than, 
as the ambassadors of Christ, to deliver his instructions ; and 
for their own part, they expressly disclaim all dominion over 
the faith and consciences of men ; see 2 Cor. v. 20 ; chap i. 24. 

The Jewish writers distinguish between the titles Rab, 
Rabbi, and Rabban. As for Rab and Rabbi, the only differ- 
ence between them is, that Rab was the title of such as had 
had their education, and taken their degree, in some foreign 
Jewish school ; suppose at Babylon, where there was a school 

* Pirke Abhoth, cap. i. sect. xvi. which precept Maimonides and Bar- 
tenora (in loc.) restrain tcrtitual observances. 

f Talmud Babylon, tit. Berachoth, fol. xxii. ii.; see Lightfoot, Horse 
Hebr. Matt, xxiii. 7. 

\ Maimon. in Prasfat. Tractat.; Pirke Abhoth, Mishn. torn. iv. p. 393. 

§ See Whitby on Matt, xxiii. 8, 9. 



284 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



or academy of considerable note ; Rabbi was the title of such 
as were educated in the land of Judea, who were accounted 
more honourable than the others. # But as for Rabban, it 
was the highest title ; which, they say, was never conferred 
on more than seven persons, namely, on R. Simeon, five of 
his descendants, and on R. Jochanan, who was of a different 
family.f It was on this account, it should seem, that the 
blind man gave this title to Christ, Mark x. 51 ; being con- 
vinced that he was possessed of divine power, and worthy of 
the most honourable distinctions. And Mary Magdalene, 
when she saw Christ after his resurrection, " said unto him, 
Rabboni/' John xx. 16, that is, my Rabban, like my lord in 
English ; for rabbon is the same with rabban, only pronounced 
according to the Syriac dialect. 

* Elias Levita in Tishbi, voce y~\. 

f See Lightfoot's Harmony on Luke ii. 25. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



OF THE NAZARITES AND RECH AB1TES. 

Godwin makes a three-fold distinction of Nazarites, which 
we shall find to be merely a distinctio nominis, as the logi- 
cians express themselves, and not a divisio generis in 
species. 

The first sort, called Nazarites, from 1?3 nazar, separavit, 
are mentioned several times in the Old and New Testament ; 
the second, whose name is derived from the city Nazareth, 
are occasionally mentioned in the New ; for the third, who 
rejected the five books of Moses, and were therefore termed 
Nazarites, according to Godwin, from itttt nasar, dissecuit, 
because they cut off or excluded these books from the canon 
of Scripture ; finding no mention of them either in the Old 
Testament, or in the New, I think they deserve no farther 
notice : it is chiefly the first sort that we are now to con- 
sider. 

The first person to whom the title nazir is applied is 
Joseph, who, in the forty-ninth chapter of Genesis, is said to 
be ^nN "W3 nezir echaiv, which we render M separated from 
his brethren," Gen. xlix. 26 ; but the Vulgate, " Nazaraei 
inter fratres suos." Moses gives him the same title, in the 
blessing which he pronounced on his posterity in the Book of 
Deuteronomy : " Let the blessing come upon the head of 
Joseph, and upon the top of the head of him that was sepa- 
rated from his brethren," Deut. xxxiii. 16; ^I7K "M3 nezir 
echaiv. He is called *WJ nazir, not because he was of any 
particular sect, or such a Nazarite as those concerning whom 
we are discoursing ; but for one or other of the following rea- 
sons : either because he was separated from the society of his 
brethren by their malice toward him ; or from their evil prac- 
tices and examples, by the grace of God ; or was advanced by 
Providence so high above them in dignity and honour. The 



286 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



Septuagint espouses the last-mentioned reason, reading i%rrN "Wi 
nezir echaiv, in Genesis, em icopv(f>r)g wv r\yr\(jaTo aSf X^ojv, super 
caput fratrum, quorum dux fuit; and in Deuteronomy, 
em Kopv^rjc SoZavSug eir adeXtyotg, super verticem glorificatus 
in fratribus. Hence the word "IT3 nezer is sometimes used 
for a royal or sacerdotal crown or diadem : " Thou hast pro- 
faned his (the king's) crown, *tn nezer, by casting it to the 
ground Psalm lxxxix. 23. Again, " They made the plate 
of the holy crown (of the high-priest) of pure gold;" Exod. 
xxxix. 30. 

But whatever was the reason of Joseph's being called m 
nazir, the word came afterward to denote a particular sort 
of separation and devoted ness to God ; and on that account 
was applied to the Nazarites, who were accordingly of two 
sorts — such as were by their parents devoted to God in their 
infancy, or even sometimes before they were born, and such 
as devoted themselves. The former are called Nazarai na- 
tivi, and were Nazarites for life ; the latter Nazarai votivi, 
who ordinarily bound themselves to observe the laws of the 
Nazarites only for a limited time. 

In the number of the Nazarai nativi, or perpetual Naza- 
rites, were Samson, Judges xiii. 5; Samuel, 1 Sam. i. 11 ; 
and John the Baptist, Luke i. 15. All that we can discover 
in their way of life, which was peculiar, was, that they were 
to abstain from wine and intoxicating liquors, and were not to 
shave their heads, but let their hair grow to its full length. 
It is true, neither Samuel nor John the Baptist are expressly 
called Nazarites, as Samson is. Nevertheless, as one law of 
the Nazarites is mentioned to which Samuel was obliged, 
namely, that no razor should come upon his head ; and another 
to which the Baptist was obliged, that he should drink nei- 
ther wine nor strong drink ; it is reasonably presumed they 
were both under obligation to observe all the laws of the per- 
petual Nazarites. 

The rabbies insist that Absalom was a perpetual Nazarite, 
because he wore his hair so long, that when he polled it, it 
weighed two hundred shekels ; 2 Sam. xiv. 26. But as this 
circumstance is mentioned immediately after the account of 
the beauty of his person, ver. 25, it leads one to conclude, 
that he wore his hair so long, rather for ornament, than on 



CHAP. VIII.] OF THE NAZARITES. 287 

any religious account. Besides, his polling it at the end of 
the year is an evidence against his being a perpetual Nazarite. 
The rabbies, indeed, have framed a rule for the perpetual 
Nazarites, on purpose not to exclude Absalom ; affirming, 
that when their hair grew very heavy and troublesome, they 
were allowed to cut it to the length in which it was ordinarily 
worn by other people, but not to shave it quite off ; and this, 
they say, was the reason of Absalom's polling his head every 
year, because his hair grew so exceeding heavy, that what he 
cut off, weighed " two hundred shekels, after the king's 
weight." # 

We shall not stay to dispute this point with the rabbies, 
because it is of no great consequence. But the amazing 
" weight of Absalom's hair demands our particular attention. 
Dr. Cumberland, in his Essay on Jewish Weights and Mea- 
sures, shows, that a Jewish shekel of silver was equal to half 
an ounce avoirdupoise. Consequently, two hundred shekels 
is six pounds and a quarter ; an incredible weight for the hair 
of one man's head ! 

Various are the conjectures of the learned in order to re- 
move this difficulty. Some suppose the shekel here spoken 
of was less than the common shekel ; and they observe his 
hair is said to weigh " two hundred shekels after the king's 
weight," not according to the common shekel of the sanc- 
tuary. Now, should we suppose the shekel here meant to 
be a weight in gold equal to the value of the silver shekel, or 
half ounce, that would reduce the weight of the hair to about 
five ounces. 

Others imagine there has been an error in transcribing the 
Hebrew copy ; that the number of shekels being expressed 
by the numeral letter D caph, which stands for twenty, the 
transcriber mistook it for 1 resh, which stands for two hun- 
dred ; a mistake which might easily be made if the lower 
part of the caph was not very plain. 

Others again are of opinion, that the two hundred shekels 
denote, not the weight but the value of the hair ; the Jewish 
women having been used to purchase it to adorn themselves. 

* Vid. R. de Bartenor. ; et Maimon. Comment, in Mishn. tit. Nazir, cap. 
i. sect. ii. torn. iii. p. 148, edit. Surenhus. 



288 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



It cannot, indeed, be easily supposed, that the king's son sold 
his hair. But the verb bpW shakal, rendered " he weighed," 
may be taken impersonally,* to signify, it was weighed at the 
rate of two hundred shekels, perhaps by the barber, whose 
perquisite it might be. 

Where we cannot arrive at certainty, we must be content 
with probability; and, I apprehend, either of these conjec- 
tures is sufficiently probable to relieve the difficulty in the 
text. 

We return to the Nazarites : I have only farther to ob- 
serve concerning the Nazarai nativi, that they were not 
bound to the same strictness as the votivi, who must not 
touch any dead carcass, nor so much as enter the doors of a 
house where a deceased person was. Samson, who was a 
Nazar&us nativus, made no scruple of taking honey out of 
the carcass of a lion, Judges xiv. 8, 9 ; and Samuel hewed 
Agag in pieces ; 1 Sam. xv. 33. 

As for the Nazarai votivi, who bound themselves by a 
vow to observe the law of the Nazarites for a certain time, 
suppose a month (the rabbies say it could not be for a less 
time, though it might be for a longer),f their laws, which are 
contained in the sixth chapter of the Book of Numbers, are 
these : — 

1st. That they should abstain from wine, and from all 
inebriating liquors, and even from eating grapes, during the 
time of their separation; Numb. vi. 3, 4. 

2dly. That they should let their hair grow without cutting- 
it till the days of their vow were fulfilled, ver. 6 ; and then 
they were to have their hair shaved off at the door of the 
tabernacle, and burnt under the altar; ver. 18. It was pro- 
bably from this custom of the Jewish Nazarites, that the Gen- 
tiles learnt the practice of consecrating their hair to their 
godsj of which Suetonius relates an instance in his life of 
Nero ; informing us, that he cut off his first beard, and put it 

* See many instances of this sort produced by Giassius, Philolog. Sacra, 
lib. iii. tract, iii. de Verbo, canon xxiii. p. 380, 381, edit. Amstel. 1711. 

t Mish. tit. Nazir, cap. i. sect. iii. p. 148, torn. iii. edit. Surenhus. 

X Lucian represents this as a very common custom, with which he him- 
self had complied, de Syria Dea, sub fin. 



CHAP. VIII.] 



OF THE NAZAR1TES. 



289 



into a golden box set with jewels, and consecrated it to 
Jupiter Capitolinus.* 

hen a Nazarteus votivus was polluted by touching any 
dead body, he was to " shave his head on the seventh day," 
that is, at the end of the time during which he was unclean, 
and " on the eighth day to offer a sin-offering and a burnt- 
offering for his purification;" and then to " consecrate unto 
the Lord the days of his separation, " bringing a " lamb of 
the first year for a trespass-offering:" that is, he was to begin 
again the accomplishment of his vow, " the days which were 
before having been lost, because his separation was defiled;" 
Numb. vi. 9 — 12. The Nazarite's shaving his head in case 
of pollution is not ordered to be done, as in case of the ac- 
complishment of his vow, at the temple; but might be done 
any where, it seems, in the country, provided it was not so 
far distant as to prevent his offering the accustomed sacrifices 
at the temple the next day. However, some learned men 
have thought, that those who were at a great distance, or in 
foreign countries, might have their head shaved in the place 
where they were, and offer the appointed sacrifice at the tem- 
ple the next opportunity, whether on account of accidental 
pollution, or at the accomplishment of their vow.f Thus 
they say Paul (according to others, AquilaJ) did, Acts xviii. 
18, who made his vow at Corinth, shaved his head at Cen- 
chrea, and went soon afterward to Jerusalem to accomplish it 
by the usual offering.^ 

3diy. A Nazarite must not come near any dead body, 
while the vow was upon him; Numb. vi. 6. 

It is to be observed, that women, as well as men, might 

* Sueton. in Vit. Neronis, cap. xii. 11, p. 176, 177, torn. ii. edit. Pitisci, 
Traject. ad Rhen. 1690. 

f Steph. Morin. dissert, viii. p. 103; Grotius, on Acts xviii. 18; Ancient 
Universal History, in the History of the Jews, book i. chap. vii. 

X Witsii Meletem. de Vita Pauli, sect. vii. xiii. p. 100, et xv. ad fin. 
p. 102 ; Grotius in loc. 

§ Concerning St. Paul's vow, see Doddridge in loc.; Lardner's Credib. 
vol. i. book L chap. ix. sect. vii. ; Benson's History of Planting the Christian 
Religion, vol. ii. chap. v. sect. xiii. and chap. viii. sect, xi.; Hammond in 
loc; Wolfii Curae Philolog. in loc; and Meinhard de Pauli Nazireeatu, 
apud Thesaur. Philolog. Theolog. torn. ii. p. 473, especially cap. iv., Am- 
stel 17C 2. 

u 



290 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



bind themselves by this vow: " When either man or woman 
shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite," then 
they shall do so and so; Numb. vi. 2. This the mother of 
Samson is advised by the angel to do, at least to submit to 
the rule of the Nazarites during the time of her gestation ; 
Judges xiii. 7. 

The institution of Nazaritism was no doubt partly religious, 
and it might also be partly civil and prudential. 

That it was partly religious is concluded from the following 
passage of the prophet Amos, in which, among other extraor- 
dinary favours and blessings which God had vouchsafed to the 
Israelites, he tells them, fi I raised up of your sons for pro- 
phets, and of your young men for Nazarites," chap. ii. 1 1 ; that 
is, I inspired them with a more than ordinary spirit of devotion 
and piety, and induced them to take the Nazarite's vow, by 
which they were bound to the strictest sanctity, to give them- 
selves to reading, meditation, and prayer : and, in token of 
their moral purity, carefully to avoid all legal pollution, and, 
in sign of their spiritual mortification, and as having their 
minds so taken up with divine contemplation as to be negli- 
gent of external ornaments, they were to let their hair grow 
without trimming. Moreover, they were to abstain from wine 
and all inebriating liquors during the days of their separation ; 
just as the priests were forbidden to drink wine during their 
attendance on their ministry, '* lest they forget the law," and 
their minds should be discomposed for the exercises of devo- 
tion. 

The interdiction laid on the Nazarites was more strict and 
severe than that laid upon the priests. The former were for- 
bidden the total use of the vine, they might neither taste " any 
liquor made of grapes, whether wine or vinegar, nor eat moist 
grapes, nor dried, neither any thing that came of the vine- 
tree, from the kernel even to the husk;" Numb. vi. 3, 4. 
Which occasions Dr. Lightfoot's making the two following 
queries : — 

1st. Whether the vine- tree might not be the tree in Para- 
dise, which was forbidden to Adam, and, by tasting the fruit 
of which, he sinned and fell. The Jewish doctors, he saith, 
positively asserted this, without the least hesitation. 

2dly. Whether the law about the Nazarites had not some 



CHAP. VIII.] 



OF THE NAZARITES. 



291 



reference to Adam, while under that prohibition in his state 
of innocence ? If the bodily and legal uncleanness, concern- 
ing which there are precepts so very strict in the thirteenth 
chapter of Leviticus ; if the leprosy especially, the greatest of 
all uncleannesses, properly betokened the state and nature of 
sin ; might not the laws concerning Nazarites, which enjoined 
the strictest purity in the most pure religion, insomuch that 
Nazavites are said to be " purer than snow, and whiter than 
milk," Lam. iv. 7, be designed in commemoration of the 
state of innocence before the fall ? # 

But beside the religious, there might also be a civil and 
prudential use of this institution, the sobriety and temperance 
which the Nazarites were bound to observe being very con- 
ducive to health. Accordingly they are celebrated for their 
fair and ruddy complexion, being said to be both whiter than 
milk, and more ruddy in body than rubies, Lam. iv. 7; the 
sure signs of a sound and Ji earthy constitution. It may here 
be observed, that when God intended to raise up Samson by 
his strength of body to scourge the enemies of Israel, he 
ordered, that from his infancy he should drink no wine, but 
live by the rule of the Nazarites, because that would greatly 
contribute to make him strong and healthy ; intending, after 
nature had done its utmost to form this extraordinary instru- 
ment of his providence, to supply its defect by his own super- 
natural power.f 

Godwin mentions a second sort of Nazarites, who were so 
termed from "iJtt natsar, from whence came Natzareth or Na- 
zareth, the name of a town in Galilee, where Christ was con- 
ceived and brought up. Hence our Saviour was himself called 
a Nazarene, or Nazarite, Matt. ii. 23; for this name or title, 
as applied to Christ, is sometimes wrote NaZapqvog, Mark xiv. 
67; xvi. 6; Luke iv. 34; sometimes Na%opaiog, Matt. xxvi. 
71; John xviii. 7, 8; Acts ii. 22; which words seem to be 

* Lightfoot, Horse Hebr. in Luc. i. 15. 

j- Concerning the Nazarites, see Ainsworth on Numb, vi.; Relandi Antiq. 
Hebraeor. part ii. cap. x.; Leusden. Philolog. Hebrseo-Mixt. dissert, xxii.; 
Spanheim. Dubia Evang. p. ii. dub. xciii. xciv. ; Meinhard de Nazirseatu 
Pauli, ubi supra; and Sigonius de Republ. Hebrseor. lib. v. cap. viii. cum 
notis Nicolai, Lugd. Bat. 1701, 

u 2 



292 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I . 



used by the evangelists in precisely the same sense; accord- 
ingly the Syriac version renders both by the word uotzrio. 

The evangelist Matthew, assigning as the reason for our 
Saviour's being called NaZapmog, that he came and dwelt in 
the city of Nazareth, Matt. ii. 23, and referring to some pro- 
phecy, which, at least in express words, is no where to be 
found in all the Old Testament, hath given the critics and 
commentators no little trouble: " that it might be fulfilled/' 
saith he, " which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be 
called a Nazarene." Some, indeed, suppose the reference is 
to what is said of Samson, # whom they take to be a type of 
Christ, " The child shall be a Nazarite unto God/' Judges 
xiii. 5; and this, they say, was accomplished in his antitype. 
Othersf conceive the prophecy is to be found in Isaiah, 
where Christ is termed netzer, '* the branch," chap. xi. 1. 
Witsius thinks he discovers it in the book of Job, chap. vii. 20, 
and in several other places, where God is called nsni ?iotzer> 
the " preserver of men. "J However, there is one very mate- 
rial objection against all these solutions, that they give no 
account how this was fulfilled by Christ's being at Nazareth. 
Either, therefore, we must acquiesce in the opinion of Chry- 
sostom,§ that the passage here referred to is lost ;|| or, in 
that more probable one of Jerome, that the evangelist does 
not here refer to any one particular passage, but to what 
several of the prophets had in effect said. For in that he uses 
the word prophets in the plural number, it is evident, saith 
that father, he did not take the words from the Scripture, but 
the sense only.^f Now, being called a Nazarene is the same 
thing as being one, the Hebrews expressing word and thing 
by the same term. The name of God in many places signi- 
fies God himself, " His name shall be called," means, he 

'* Kidder on the Messiah, part ii. p. 67, 68, second edit. fol. 1726. 
f See Hammond on Matt. ii. 23 ; and Deylingius, in his Observationes 
Sacrse, part i. observ. xl. sect. iii. p. 177, 178, Lipsise, 1720. 
X Meletem. diss. ii. sect. xvi. xvii. p. 285 — 287. 
§ Homil. in Matt. ix. 

|| So Mr. Whiston supposes ; see his Sermons at Boyle's Lecture, on the 
Accomplishment of Prophecies, p. 54, Cambridge, 1708. 
f See the passage quoted by Whitby on Matt. ii. 23. 



CHAP. VIII.] 



OF THE RECHABITES. 



293 



shall be " Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the 
Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace;" Isa. ix. 6. " My 
house shall be called," signifies, my house shall be "the house 
of prayer :" chap. lvi. 7; Mark xi. 17. The meaning, then, of 
Christ's being called NaZapaiog may be, that he shall be de- 
spised and reproached, according to a variety of predictions, 
Psalm xxii. 6; lxix. 9 ; Isa. liii. 3 — 5; Zech. xi. 12, 13; which 
were accomplished, in one instance at least, by his being 
called a Nazarite, from his having dwelt at Nazareth, that 
being a town of such ill repute, that it was commonly thought 
no good could come out of it, John i. 46 ; and our Saviour's 
being supposed to come out of it being one occasion of his 
being despised and rejected by the Jews, chap. vii. 52. 

Nevertheless, the appellation NaZapmog, of Nazareth, com- 
ing to be added to Jesus, to distinguish him from all others of 
the same name, we find it sometimes applied to him when no 
reproach was intended, as by St. Peter, Acts ii. 22; iii. 6: 
iv. 10; and by an angel, Mark xvi. 6. It is, however, ge 
nerally used by the Jews as a term of reproach, not only in 
respect to our Saviour himself, but to his disciples after his 
ascension. They styled them, "the sect of the Nazarenes ;" 
Acts xxiv. 5. Nevertheless, the disciples of Christ, after 
they had generally taken the name of Christians, turned the 
tables upon the Jews, giving this title of reproach to the Ju- 
daizing Christians ; as we learn from Epiphanius ; who says, 
the Nazarenes were the same with the Jews in every thing re- 
lating to the doctrine and ceremonies of the Old Testament, 
only differing from them in this, that they professed to believe, 
that Jesus Christ was the Messiah. # These were the heretics 
Godwin speaks of under the name of Nazarites. But the 
history and dogmata of this sect belong rather to Christian, 
than to Jewish antiquities.f 

As to the Rechabites, though they dwelt among the Israel- 
ites, they did not belong to any of their tribes ; for they were 
Kenites, as appears from the second chapter of the First Book 

* Epiphan. Adversus Haereses, hser, xxix. sect. vii. apud Oper. torn, i, 
p, 122, edit. Petav. Colon. 1682. 

f See, on this title of Christ, Spanheim. Dubia Evangel, part ii. dub, xe, 
xei. xciii.; Witsii Meletem. dissert, ii.; and the commentators on Matt 
ii. 23, 



294 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK i. 



of Chronicles, where the Kenites are said to have come of 
" Hemath, the father of the house of Rechab ;" ver. 55. 
These Kenites, afterward styled Rechabites, were of the 
family of Jethro, otherwise called Hobab, whose daughter 
Moses married * for " the children of the Kenite, Moses's 
father-in-law," it is said, " went up out of the city of palm- 
trees with the children of Judah, and dwelt among the peo- 
ple," Judges i. 16 ; and we read of " Heber the Kenite, who 
was of the children of Hobab, the father-in-law of Moses, 
who had severed himself from the Kenites," or from the bulk 
of them who settled in the tribe of Judah, " and pitched his 
tent in the plain of Zaanaim;" chap. iv. 11. They appear 
to have sprung from Midian, the son of Abraham by Keturah, 
Gen. xxv. 2; for Jethro, from whom they are descended, is 
called a Midianite; Numb. x. 29. This Jethro was invited by 
Moses, his son-in-law T , to leave his country, and settle with 
his family among the Israelites. At first he refused, ver. 30; 
but afterward, being importuned, ver. 31, 32, it seems he 
consented ; since we find his posterity settled among the 
Israelites, with whom they continued till their latest ages. 
Balaam, therefore, celebrates their prudence and happiness, 
in putting themselves under the protection of God's favourite 
nation, though he foretells, that they should be fellow-sufferers 
in the captivity; Numb. xxiv. 21, 22. Of this family was 
Jehonadab, the son of Rechab, a man of eminent zeal for the 
pure worship of God against idolatry, who assisted king Jehu 
in destroying the house of Ahab, and the worshippers of 
Baal ; 2 Kings x. 15, 16. 23, &c. It was he who gave that 
rule of life to his children and posterity, which we read of in 
the thirty-fifth chapter of Jeremiah, ver. 6, 7. It consisted of 
these three articles : — 

1st. That they should drink no wine. 

2dly. That they should neither possess nor occupy any 
houses, fields, or vineyards. 

3dly. That they should dwell in tents. 

In these regulations he seems to have had no religious, but 
merely a prudential view, as is intimated in the reason as- 
signed for them, ver, 7, " that you may live many days in the 
land where you are strangers." And this would be the na- 
tural consequence of observing these rules, inasmuch, 



CHAP. VIII.] OF THE RECH ABITES. 



295 



1st. As their temperate way of living would very much 
contribute to preserve their health : and as, 

2dly. They would hereby avoid giving umbrage to, and 
exciting the envy of the Jews, who might have been provoked, 
by their engaging and succeeding in the principal business in 
which they themselves were employed, namely, tillage and 
vine-dressing, to expel them their country; by which they 
would have been deprived of the religious advantages they 
then enjoyed. That they might, therefore, be under no 
temptation to plant and cultivate vineyards, he forbade them 
the use of wine. 

Should it be inquired how they maintained themselves, it 
may be answered, they are, in the First Book of Chronicles, 
called Scribes, chap. ii. 55, which intimates, that they were 
engaged in some sort of literary employments. 

I suppose the reason of Godwin's treating of the Nazarites 
and Rechabites in the same chapter is, that neither of them 
drank wine; for in no other respect were they alike, the 
former being a religious, and the latter merely a prudential 
and civil institution.* 

* Vid. Witsii Dissert, de Rechabitis, prefixed to his Latin translation of 
Godwin's Moses and Aaron, inserted into Hottinger's edition, and printed 
likewise in Witsii Miscellan. torn. ii. 



CHAPTER IX. 



OF THE ASSIDEA NS. 

After the spirit of prophecy ceased, and there were no in- 
spired persons to whom the Jews could apply to decide their 
religious doubts and disputes, different opinions soon sprang 
up among them, and divided them into various sects and par- 
ties; the chief of which were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, 
and the Essenes, all supposed to arise from the Assideans, 
who are entitled, therefore, to our first attention. 

The Hebrew word D^Pn chasidim, is used in several places 
of Scripture appellatively, for good and pious men, Psalm 
cxlix. 1; cxlv. 10; Isa. lvii. 1 ; Mic. vii. 2; but never, I 
apprehend, for a religious sect. In the apocryphal book of 
the Maccabees, indeed, we often meet with the aaiSaioi, a word 
plainly derived from the Hebrew D^npn chasidim; as in the 
following passage: " There came to Mattathias a company of 
Assideans, who were mighty men of Israel, even all such as 
were voluntarily devoted unto the law," 1 Mace. ii. 42; see 
also chap. vii. 13, and 2 Mace. xiv. 16. These Assideans, 
spoken of in the Maccabees, have generally been supposed 
to be some sect subsisting at that time. Yet as Josephus 
wrote of the same times and of the same affairs, without men- 
tioning any such sect, some have doubted, and not without 
reason, whether there ever was any such, and whether the 
word aaidaioi be not used in the Maccabees, as Dvrspn chasidim 
is in the Hebrew Bible, for pious persons in general, even 
such as " were voluntarily devoted unto the law." And it is 
no improbable conjecture, that as they were persons generally 
of that character, who, in defence of their law and religion, 
first adhered to Mattathias, and afterward to his son Judas 
Maccabseus, the name aatdaioi, or saints, was by their enemies 
converted into a term of reproach and scorn, as the word 
puritans was in the last century, and saints very often is now. 



CHAP. IX.] 



OF THE A SSIDEANS. 



297 



And as I see no sufficient evidence of the aatdaioi, in the time' 
of the Maccabees, being a distinct sect from other pious Jews, 
I lay no stress upon Godwin's distinction between the D*|>T2C 
tsadikim and the D^Pn chasidim, which, he saith, took place 
after the captivity, and consisted in the following particulars : 
the tsadikim gave themselves to the study of the Scripture ; 
the chasidim studied how to add to the Scripture ; the former 
would conform to whatever the law required ; the latter would 
be holy above the law ; thus to the repairing of the temple, 
the maintaining of sacrifices, the relief of the poor, &c, they 
would voluntarily add over and above, to that which the law 
required. 

Neither do I think it probable, as Godwin supposes, that 
this apostle refers to any such distinction when he saith, 
" Scarcely for a righteous man, Siicaiov, would one die ; yet 
peradventure for a good man, ayaSov, some would even dare 
to die;" Rom. v. 7, 8. By the ayaSog, or good man, the 
apostle rather meant a kind, benevolent, charitable man, than 
such as were for adding to the divine law, and performing 
works of supererogation. In this sense the word ayaOog is 
continually used in the New Testament. For instance, in the 
Gospel of St. Matthew we meet with this expression, " Is 
thine eye evil because I am good ?" or beneficent, ay aSog, 
Matt. xx. 15. In the Epistle to the Romans, " Be not 
overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good," ayaSu), with 
kind and generous actions; chap. xii. 21. In the Epistle to 
Philemon, to ayaSov means " thy kindness," ver. 14; and 
in the apocryphal book of Ecclesiasticus, ayaSog otySaX- 
fxog signifies " the liberal eye;" chap. xxxv. 8. The mean- 
ing and design of the apostle, therefore, in the passage before 
us, may be thus represented : So engaging are the charms of 
generosity and benevolence above mere righteousness and 
justice, that though scarcely any man will hazard his life for 
one who has nothing but the latter to recommend him, 
several might be found, who would run this important risk to 
prevent the death or destruction of a disinterested and gene- 
rous friend. But the love of Christ (for it is to illustrate 
that love the apostle makes this observation) appears to be 
far more free, generous, and exalted, than any instance of 



298 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK;I 



human friendship, in that when we were yet sinners, and 
possessed, therefore, of none of these good or amiable qua- 
lities to recommend us, he laid down his life for us. # 

The D*p*T2f tsadikim, Godwin imagines, were the same with 
the D*NHp karraim, or Karraites. It is certain the Karraites 
were anciently a considerable sect, which is still in being in 
Poland and Russia, but chiefly in Turkey and Egypt. 

They have their name from the Chaldee word *op kara, 
scriptura sacra, because they adhered to the Scriptures as 
the whole and only rule of their faith and practice ; which 
occasioned their being called DWIp karraim, textuales, or 
script uarii, while those who adhered to the traditions taught 
by the rabbies were called D*2Q*1 rabbanim, rabbinista. 

These party names were first given them about thirty years 
before Christ, when, upon the dissension between Hillel, the 
president of the Sanhedrim, and Shammai, the vice-president, 
by which their respective scholars were listed into two parties, 
between whom there were perpetual contests, those that w 7 ere 
of the opinion of the Karraites sided with the school of Sham- 
mai, and those who were zealous for traditions, with the school 
of Hillel. Nevertheless, though the name D**T»p karraim be 
thus modern, the sect boasts of their high antiquity; for they 
say they are the followers of Moses and the prophets, as they 
undoubtedly are on account of their adhering to the Scriptures, 
in opposition to human traditions. Yet Dr. Prideaux says 
they did not reject all traditions absolutely, only refused them 
the same authority as they allowed to the written word. As 
human helps, conducive to their better understanding the Scrip- 
tures, they were content to admit them, but not to put them on 
a foot with the written oracles of God, as all the other Jews did.f 

The Karraites differ also from the rest of the Jews in this, 
that they read the Scriptures, as well as their liturgies, every 
where, both in public and private, in the language of the 

* Concerning the Assideans, consult Drusius de Hasidseis, and De Tribus 
Sectis Judaeorum, lib. iv. cap. x. — xiii.; and also his Quaest. Hebr. lib. i. 
quaest. xlvii.; Scaliger's Elenchos Trihaereseos Judaeorum, cap. xxii.; Fuller's 
Miscell. Sacra, lib. i. cap.viii., and Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book v. sub 
anno 107, vol. iii. p. 256, 257, 10th edit. 

f Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book v. sub anno 107, vol. iii. p. 476. 



CHAP. IX.] 



OF THE KARRAITES. 



299 



country in which they dwell : at Constantinople, in modern 
Greek ; in Caffa, in Turkish, &c. # 

As the school of Hillel prevailed against that of Shammai, 
the Rabbinists became the popular sect, and the Karraites 
were looked upon as schismatics and heretics, being loaded 
with much reproach by the other Jews ; though in reality, of 
all their sects, they were the purest and most pious. They 
are frequently branded with the name Sadducees by the Jewish 
rabbies, by whom, I suppose, Godwin was led into the mis- 
take which he commits, when he represents them as rejecting 
not only traditions, but all Scripture, except the five books of 
Moses. The truth is, all the Sadducees agreed with the 
Karraites in rejecting traditions, but the Karraites by no 
means agreed with the Sadducees in rejecting the greater 
part of the Scriptures. 

As the Rabbinists interpret the Scriptures by the traditions 
which the Karraites reject, it is no wonder they differ in the 
sense of many texts, and practise the rites of worship in a 
different manner. Reland reckons up six articles of difference 
between the Karraites and other Jews : — 

1st. The Rabbinists reckon the feast of the new moon, and 
the beginning of the month, by astronomical calculations ; the 
Karraites begin the month with the first appearance of the 
moon after the change. 

2dly. The Rabbinists killed the paschal lamb in the after- 
noon, when the sun was declining ; the Karraites not till after 
the sun was set. 

3dly. The Rabbinists admitted the whole family to eat the 
passover; the Karraites, none but the males, and of them 
only such as were of age. 

4thly. The Rabbinists held, that what remained of the 
passover, was to be burnt on the sixteenth day of the month, 
or, if that proved the Sabbath, on the seventeenth ; the Kar- 
raites, that it was always to be burnt on the fifteenth ; see 
Exod. xii. 10. 

5thly. They differed about the meaning of the law concern- 
ing the offering of the sheaf of the first-fruits ; Lev. xxiii. 10, 
1 1 . The Rabbinists offered it the day after the passover ; the 

* Hottingeri Thesaur. Philolog. inter Addenda, p. 583, edit. Tigur. 1649. 



300 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I 



Karraites thought it was to be offered the day after the Sab- 
bath next to the passover. 

6thly. In the feast of tabernacles, the Rabbinists carry 
about branches and a citron, in a sort of procession ; the Kar- 
raites allow of no such ceremony.* 

It may not be improper to observe, that the Mohammedans 
are distinguished into two sects, in some measure analogous 
to the Rabbinists and Karraites among the Jews ; namely, the 
Sonnites and the Shiites. The Sonnites are so called, because 
they acknowledge the authority of the Sonna, or collection of 
traditions concerning the sayings and actions of their prophet, 
which is a kind of supplement to the Koran, directing the 
observance of several things there omitted, and in name, as 
well as design, answering to the Mishna of the Jews. 

The Shiites, which name properly signifies sectaries, or ad- 
herents in general, but is peculiarly applied to the sect of Ali, 
reject the Sonna as apocryphal and fabulous. These acknow- 
ledge Ali, the son-in-law of Mohammed, for his true and law- 
ful successor, and even prefer him to Mohammed himself. 
The Turks are Sonnites ; the Persians Shiites. These two 
Mohammedan sects have as great an antipathy to one another 
as any two sects, either of Jews or Christians. So greatly is 
Spinoza mistaken, in preferring the order of the Mohammedan 
church to that of the Roman, because no schisms have arisen 
in the former since its birth .f 

* Vid. Relandi Antiquitat. Hebraeor. part ii. cap. ix. sect. xii. ; see also, 
on the subject of the Karraites, Trigland. de Secta Karaeorum ; Father Si- 
mon's Histoire Critique Vieux Testament, liv. i. ch. xxix., or the Latin edi- 
tion, p. 145 ; and also his Disquisitiones Criticae, cap. xii.; R. Mardochaeus 
Karaeus, apud Wolfii Notitiam Karaeorum ; Basnage, Hist, of the Jews, book 
ii. chap. viii. ix. 

f Vid. Spinoz. Opera Posthuma, p. 613; and Sale's Preliminary Discourse 
to his Translation of the Koran, sect. viii. p. 175. 178, London, 1734, 



CHAPTER X. 



OF THE PHARISEES. 

The Pharisees derived their name, not, as some have sup- 
posed, from ehd pharash, exposuit, because they were in the 
highest reputation for expounding the law; for it appears by 
the rabbies there were women Pharisees, to whom that office 
did not appertain : but either, as Godwin apprehends, from 
W1D pirresh, in the conjugation pihel ; or from D*1D pharas, 
devisit, partitus est, which is sometimes written with a W sin; 
see Mic. iii. 3; Lam. iv. 4. DM^DD pherushim, in the He- 
brew dialect, or ^itfnD pherishin, or NVitfs^D pherishe, according 
to the Chaldee, signifies persons who were separated from 
others; which name, therefore, was assumed by the Pharisees, 
not because they held separate assemblies for divine worship, 
but because they pretended to a more than ordinary sanctity 
and strictness in religion. Thus in the Acts of the Apostles 
the Pharisees are said to be aKpifitaTciTr) aiptcrig, the most 
exact sect of the Jewish religion, chap. xxvi. 5; agreeable 
to the account Josephus gives, that this sect was thought 
BvaefieaTtpov sivat twv aXXiov, to be more pious and devout 
than others, and to interpret the law with greater accuracy. # 
In another place he saith, they valued themselves in their 
exactness on the law, and on their skill in the interpretation 
of it ; and seemed to excel all others in the knowledge and 
observation of the customs of their fathers 

It is very uncertain when this sect first sprung up; but 
there is no doubt its date, as well as that of all other religious 
sects among the Jews, ought to be fixed later than the death 
of Malachi, when the spirit of prophecy ceased from Israel. 

* Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. i. cap. v. sect. ii. p. 63, Haverc. ; see also 
lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. xiv. p. 166. 

f Antiq. lib. xvii. cap. ii. sect, iv. p. 830; et in Vita sua, sect, xxxviii. 
p. 18. 



302 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



We read, indeed, of persons much of the same spirit and 
temper with the Pharisees in Isaiah, who said, " Stand by 
thyself, come not near me; for I am holier than thou chap, 
lxv. 5. But this only shows there were proud hypocrites 
before the sect of the Pharisees arose. 

I know not upon what authority Godwin makes Antigonus 
Socheus to be the founder of this sect, three hundred years 
before Christ. Dr. Lightfoot thinks, that Pharisaism rose up 
gradually, and was long before it came to the maturity of a 
sect j but when that was, he does not pretend to determine.* 
It appears by Josephus, that in the time of John Hyrcanus, 
the high-priest, and prince of the Asmonean line, about a 
hundred and eight years before Christ, the sect was not only 
formed, but made a considerable figure : insomuch, that this 
prince thought it for his interest to endeavour to ingratiate 
himself with the Pharisees, and gain them to his party. For 
this end he invited the heads of them to an entertainment, 
and, having regaled them, paid them the compliment to desire, 
that if they saw any thing in his administration unacceptable 
to God, or unjust or injurious to men, they would admonish 
him of it, and give him their advice and instructions, how it 
might be reformed and amended. Whereupon one Eleazar, 
a sour Pharisee, told him, " that if he would approve himself 
a just man, he must quit the priesthood, and content himself 
with the civil government. Upon that he was highly pro- 
voked, and went over to the Sadducees.f To what a height 
of popularity and power this sect was grown about eighty 
years before Christ, appears from another passage in Jose- 
phus. J: When king Alexander Jannaeus lay on his death- 
bed, and his wife Alexandra was exceedingly troubled at the 
ill state in which she found she and her children would be left 
on account of the hatred which she knew the Pharisees bore 
to her husband and his family, he advised her by all means to 
caress the Pharisees, since that would be the way to secure 
her the affection of the bulk of the nation ; for there were no 
such friends where they loved, and no such enemies where 
they hated ; and whether they spoke true or false, good or 

* Horee Hebr. in Matt. iii. 7. 

f Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. x. sect. v. vi. p. 662, 663. 
\ Ubi supra, cap. xv. sect, v.; et cap. xvi. sect. i. p. 675, 676. 



CHAP. X.] 



OF THE PHARISEES. 



303 



evil of any person, they would be alike believed by the com- 
mon people. With this view he enjoined her, after his death, 
to commit his body to their disposal ; and at the same time to 
assure them, that she would ever resign herself to their autho- 
rity and direction. Do this, said he, and you will not only 
gain me an honourable funeral, but yourself and your children 
a secure settlement in the government. And so it accordingly 
happened ; his funeral was more sumptuous than any of his 
predecessors, and his queen was firmly established in the 
supreme administration of the nation. 

According to Basnage, one Aristobulus, an Alexandrian 
Jew, and a peripatetic philosopher, who flourished about one 
hundred and twenty-five years before Christ, and wrote some 
commentaries on the Scripture in the allegorical way, was the 
author of those traditions, by an adherence to which chiefly 
the Pharisees were distinguished from other Jewish sects.* 
But it is by no means probable such a heap of traditions 
should spring up at once, but rather gradually ; and so, ac- 
cording to Lightfoot,+ did the sect of the Pharisees itself, till 
at length it became the most considerable of all. 

Their distinguishing dogmata may be all, in a manner, re- 
ferred to their holding the traditions of the elders, which they 
not only set upon an equal footing with the written law, but 
in many cases explained the former by the latter, quite con- 
trary to its true intent and meaning. And thus " they made 
the commandment of God of none effect by their traditions ;"■ 
Matt. xv. 6. They pretended to derive these from the same 
fountain with the written word itself ; for they say, that when 
Moses waited upon God forty days in the mount, he received 
from him a double law ; one in writing, the other traditionary, 
containing the sense and explication of the former — that 
Moses, being come to his tent, repeated it first to Aaron, then 
to Ithamar and Eleazar his sons, then to the seventy elders, 
and lastly to all the people. The rabbies farther inform us, 
that Moses at his death repeated the oral law again to Joshua ; 
that he delivered it to the elders, they to the prophets, and 
the prophets to the wise men of the great synagogue ; and so 

* Basnage's History of the Jews, book ii. chap. ix. sect. ii. p. 110, London, 
1708. 

f Lightfoot, Horse Hebr. Matt. hi. 7, sect. iii. 



304 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK t. 



it was handed through several generations, till at length R . 
Judah Haccodhesh, reflecting on the unsettled condition of 
his nation, after the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jewish 
polity, and how apt these traditionary precepts would be to 
be forgotten in their dispersion and oppression, committed 
them to writing about 150 years after Christ,* and called his 
book the Mishna, or the second law, of which we have 
formerly given an account. 

The dogmata of the Pharisees may be distinguished into 
doctrinal and practical. 

The distinguishing doctrines maintained by this sect, were 
concerning predestination and free-will, angels and spirits, and 
the future state and resurrection. 

1st. As to predestination and free-will, they went a middle 
way between the Sadducees, who denied the pre-detennination 
of human actions and events, and the Essenes, who ascribed 
all things to fate and to the stars. Whereas the Pharisees, 
according to Josephus, ascribed some things to fate, but held 
that other things were left in a man's own power, so that he 
might do them or not :f or rather, according to another ac- 
count he gives, J they held, that all things were decreed of 
God, yet not so as to take away the freedom of man's will in 
acting. 

2dly. The Pharisees held the doctrine of angels and sepa- 
rate human spirits, which the Sadducees denied ; Acts xxiii. 8. 

3dly. As to the future state and resurrection, the Pharisees 
differed both from the Sadducees and Essenes. For, whereas 
the former held that both soul and body utterly perished at 
death, and had no existence after it ; and the latter, that the 
soul would continue to exist after death, but without any fu- 
ture union with the body ; the Pharisees maintained the re- 
surrection of the bodies, at least of good men, and the future 
and eternal state of retribution to all men ; Acts xxiii. 8. 
Josephus, who was himself a Pharisee, gives this account of 
their doctrine in these points, " ^uyjjv iraaav fizv a^Oaprov, 

[MTClfiaiVZlV HC £T£pOV GW/JLCt, T^V TOJV djaSiOV f±OVK)V ,T1)V St TCOV 

* See p. 274, note*. 

t Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. v. sect. ix. p. 649. 

X De Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. xiv. p. 166; Antiq. lib. xviii. 
cap. i. sect. iii. p. 871. 



CHAP. X.} 



OF THE PHARISEES. 



305 



(pavXwv at$i(v Tifxwpia xoka^aQat : Every soul is immortal, those 
of the good only enter into another body, but those of the bad 
are tormented with everlasting punishment,* From whence 
it has been pretty generally concluded, that the resurrection 
they held was only a Pythagorean one, namely, the transmi- 
gration of the soul into another body ; from which they ex-* 
eluded all that were notoriously wicked, who were doomed at 
once to eternal punishment ; but their opinion was, that those 
who were guilty only of lesser crimes were punished for them 
in the bodies into which their souls were next sent. 

It is supposed, that it was upon this notion the disciples 
asked our Lord, " Did this man sin, or his parents, that he 
was born blind?" John ix. 2; and that some said, Matt, 
xvi. 14, Christ was " John the Baptist, some Ettas, others 
Jeremias, or one of the prophets,"f 

This was undoubtedly the opinion of the Pythagoreans,;}: 
and Platonists,§ and was embraced by some among the Jews; 
as by the author of the Book of Wisdom, who says, " that 
being good, he came into a body undenled;" chap. viji. 20. 
Nevertheless, it is questioned by some persons, whether the 
words of Josephus, before quoted, are a sufficient evidence of 
this doctrine of the metempsychosis being received by the 
whole sect of the Pharisees ; for juLtrafiaiveiv ug hepov aw/ma, 
passing into another or different body, may only denote its 
receiving a body at the resurrection ; which will be another, 
not in substance, but in quality ; as it is said of Christ at his 
transfiguration, to elSoq tov irpoa^Trov avrov trepov, " the 
fashion of his countenance was" another, or, as we render it, 
was " altered;" Luke ix. 29. 

As to the opinion which some entertained concerning our 
Saviour, that he was either John the Baptist, or Elias, or Je~. 
remias, or one of the prophets, Matt. xvi. 14, it is not 

* De Bell. Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. xiv. p. 166. 

f See Prideaux's Connect, part. ii. book v. sub anno 107 before Christ, 
vol. hi. p, 479, 480, tenth edit. London, 1729. 

I Diogen. Laert, de Vitis Philosoph, lib. viii, de Vita Pythag. segm. xiy, 
et not. Aldobrandini in loc. vol. i. p. 499, edit. Amstel. 1692. 

§ Plato in Phaedro, p. 1223, B, C, D, E, edit. Ficin. Francof. 1602; e% 
Piogen. Laert, de Vitis Philos. lib. iii. de Vita Platonis, segm. Ixvii, voL i ; 
p. 204, 205. 

k 



306 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES, 



[HOOK I. 



ascribed to the Pharisees in particular; and it' it were, I do 
not see how it could be founded on the doctrine of the me- 
tempsychosis ; since the soul of Elias, now inhabiting the 
body of Jesus, would no more make him to be Elias, than 
several others had been, in whose bodies the soul of Elias, 
according to this doctrine, is supposed to have dwelt since the 
death of that ancient prophet, near a thousand years before. 
Besides, how was it possible any person that saw Christ, who 
did not appear to be less than thirty years old, should, accord- 
ing to the notion of the metempsychosis, conceit him to be 
John the Baptist, who had been so lately beheaded ? Surely 
this apprehension must be grounded on the supposition of a 
proper resurrection. It was probably, therefore, upon the 
same account, that others took him to be Elias, and others 
Jeremias. Accordingly, St. Luke expresses it thus : " Others 
say, that one of the old prophets is risen from the dead 
Luke ix. 19. 

It may farther be observed, that the doctrine of the resur- 
rection, which St. Paul preached, was not a present me- 
tempsychosis, but a real future resurrection, which he calls 
" the hope and resurrection of the dead;" Acts xxiii. 6. This 
he professed as a Pharisee, and for this profession the par- 
tisans of that sect vindicated him against the Sadducees ; 
ver. 7 — 9. Upon the whole, therefore, it appears most rea- 
sonable to adopt the opinion of Reland, though in opposition 
to the sentiments of many other learned men, that the Pha- 
risees held the doctrine of the resurrection in a proper 
sense. # 

Thus far their doctrinal opinions appear to have been 
agreeable to the Scripture, excepting that one grand prin- 
ciple, that the traditions of the fathers came from God, and 
were at least upon an equal foot with the sacred writings. 
This was the root, the Trp^rov iptv^oQ, of various errors ; from 
hence proceeded most of the corrupt practical dogmata of 
this sect : Which we are now, 

2dly. To consider. Hence, they gave so erroneous an in- 

* Reland. Antiq. Hebr. part ii. cap. ix. sect. xiv. p. 278, third edit. Tra- 
ject. Bat. 1717. Concerning the improbability of the Pharisees having held 
the doctrine of the metempsychosis in our Saviour's time, see Buddei His- 
toria Eccles. Vet. Testament, torn. ii. per. ii. p. 1203. 



CHAP. X.] 



OF THE PHARISEE 



307 



terpretation of many texts of Scripture, explaining them ac- 
cording to their traditions; which was the occasion of their 
transgressing the commandments of God, and making them 
of none effect; Matt. xv. 3 — 6. 

Hence they fell into many very superstitious practices, in 
which they placed a great part of their religion; such as fre- 
quent washing their hands and their household furniture, be- 
yond what the law required, Mark vii. 3, 4; fasting twice a 
week, Luke xviii. 12; and, if we may credit the Talmud, 
practising many painful austerities and mortifications, whip- 
ping themselves, lying upon flints and thorns, and knocking 
their heads against walls till they made them bleed. * 

Hence being busied about trifles, and taken up with a mul-^ 
titude of rites and ceremonies, they forgot and neglected the 
great duties of morality. Thus, while they were supersti- 
tiously exact M in tithing mint, anise, and cummin, they over- 
looked the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and 
faith," Matt, xxiii. 23; and by thus placing their religion in 
things wherein true religion does not consist, they in a man- 
ner lost all notion of spiritual piety and godliness, and became 
the most finished hypocrites among the Jews. Pharisees and 
hypocrites are often joined together in the gospel history, and 
several instances of their hypocrisy mentioned, namely, their 
fasting, almsgiving, and making long prayers in the synagogues, 
and even in corners of the streets, on purpose " to be seen of 
men," and to gain their applause ; and " for a pretence, the 
better to cover their secret wickedness:" Matt. vi. 2. 5. 16; 
xxiii. 5 — 7. 14. In short, they placed the whole of religion in 
outward ceremonial observances, and therefore took no pains 
or care to get their hearts purified : they freely indulged their 
pride and malice, and all other sorts of spiritual wickedness ; 
on which account they are compared by our Saviour to whited 
sepulchres, Matt, xxiii. 27; and because they were very exact 
in their ritual observances, in which they abounded beyond 
others, they looked upon themselves to be more religious, and 

* Mish. tit. Sotah, cap. iii. sect. iv. sub fin. cum not. Bartenor et Wa- 
genseil. Sotah, excerpt. Gemar. cap. iii. sect, xi.; Drusius de Tribus Sectis, 
lib. ii. cap. xiv. p. 71, first edit. p. 253, edit. Trigland; Buxtorf. Synag 
Judaic, cap. xxv. p. 521—523, third edit. Basil, 1661. See Epiphatiius^ 
hser. xvi. sect, i, torn. i. p. 33, 34, edit, Petav, 

x 2 



308 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



the peculiar favourites of Heaven, and therefore " they trusted 
in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others," 
Luke xviii. 9; and their pride being thus fed, they affected 
pre-eminence, and expected a greater share of respect than 
others; Matt, xxiii. 6, 7. From the same criminal principle 
they " made broad their phylacteries, and enlarged the borders 
of their garments;" ver. 5. 

The phylacteries, called by the Jews pbDJl tepliillin, are 
little scrolls of parchment, in which are written certain sen- 
tences of the law, enclosed in leather cases, and bound with 
thongs on the forehead and on the left arm. They are called 
in Greek ^vXa/crrjpm, from </>vXarrw, custodio, either because 
they were supposed to preserve the law in memory, or rather, 
because they were looked upon as a kind of amulets or charms 
to keep them from danger. Godwin gives an account from 
the rabbies of the sentences of the law written in the phy- 
lacteries, and the manner of writing and folding them up, 
which is sufficiently exact.* I shall only observe, that the 
making and wearing these phylacteries, as the Jews still do 
in their private devotions, is owing to a misinterpretation of 
those texts,f on which they ground the practice, namely, God's 
commanding them " to bind the law for a sign on their hands, 
and to let it be as frontlets between their eyes," &c, Deut. vi. 8. 
This precept evidently refers to the whole law of Moses, and 
not to the particular sentences which they wrote in their phy- 
lacteries ; see ver. 6. The command of writing and binding 
this law as a sign upon the hands, and as frontlets between the 
eyes, ought doubtless to be understood metaphorically, as a 
charge to remember it, to meditate upon it, to have it as it 
were continually before their eyes, and to conduct their lives 
by it; as when Solomon says, concerning the commandments 
of God in general, " bind them about thy neck, write them 
upon the table of thy heart:" Prov, iii. 1. 3; vi. 21. The 
precept, therefore, which we are now considering, to " bind 
the words of the law for a sign upon the hands, and as front- 

* See Maimon. Tepliillin, seu de Phylacteriis, Wagenseil, Sotah, excerpt. 
Gemar. cap. ii. sect. ii. not. x. p. 397 — 418, Altdorf. 1674; and Surenhusii 
Tabular de Phylacteriis, prefixed to the first volume of his edition of the 
Mishna. 

f See Le Clerc on Exod. xiii. 9. 



CHAP. X.] 



OF THE PHARISEES. 



309 



lets between the eyes/' Deut. vi. 8, is to be explained by the 
sentence which precedes it, "These words, which I com- 
manded thee this day, shall be in thine heart." In like man- 
ner it is said elsewhere, " Ye shall lay up my words in your 
hearts and in your souls;" chap. xi. 18. However, the Jews 
understanding the foregoing precept, not metaphorically, but 
literally, wrote out the several passages wherever it occurs, 
and to which it seems to refer, and bound them upon their 
foreheads and upon their arms. 

It seems the Pharisees used to "make broad" their phy- 
lacteries. This some understand of the knots of the thongs 
by which they were fastened, which were tied very artificially 
in the form of Hebrew letters ; and that the pride of the Pha- 
risees induced them to have these knots larger than ordinary, 
as a peculiar ornament. Others supposed they affected to 
wear the phylacteries themselves very large, as if they con- 
tained more of the law than was commonly worn by their 
neighbours, and were therefore a testimony of their extra- 
ordinary affection for it. It is imagined by some persons, 
that the phylacteries are alluded to in the book of the Reve- 
lation, chap. xiii. 16, where the subjects of antichrist are said 
to be distinguished by " a mark on their right hands and on 
their foreheads. " # 

The Pharisees are farther said to u enlarge the borders of 
their garments," ra Kpacnreda twv ifnaTiwv, see Matt, xxiii. 5, 
before cited. These tcpae-ire^a were the r^tf tsitsith, the 
fringes which the Jews are, in the book of Numbers, com- 
manded to wear upon the borders of their garments, Numb, 
xv. 38, 39. The Targum of Onkelos calls them jvtddvtj 
cheruspedhin, which hath so near an affinity with the Greek 
word KpacnrtSov, that there is no doubt but it signifies the 
same thing ; which is, therefore, an evidence, that the Kpav- 
7T£§a were the I~\W!£ tsitsith. These were worn by our Saviour, 
as appears from the following passage of St. Matthew : " Be- 
hold, a woman, which w T as diseased with an issue of blood 

* See a large account of the superstition of the Jews concerning the phy- 
lacteries, in Ainsworth on Exod. xiii. 9 ; Buxtorf's Synag. Judaica, cap. ix. 
and Lexic. Talmud, in voc. i"6DJH. Consult, also, on this subject, Spenceri 
Dissert, de Nat. et Orig. Phylact. ad Calcemu torn. ii. de Legibus, edit- 
Cantab. 1727. 



310 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his 
garment," Kpa<nredov rov ifianov, Matt. ix. 20. Again, the 
inhabitants of Gennesaret are said to have brought unto him 
their diseased, and to have " besought him, that they might 
only touch the hem of his garment," KpaaireSov rov Ifianov, 
Matt. xiv. 36. KpaaweSov rov ijuanov is, in both these pas- 
sages, very improperly translated the "hem of his garment." 
It should have been rendered the fringe ; and it should seem 
the people imagined there was some peculiar virtue or sanc- 
tity in the fringe of our Saviour's garment above any other 
part, from their expectation of a miraculous cure by touching- 
it. It appears, indeed, the later Jews placed a great deal of 
sanctity in these fringes. Rabbi Menachem, on the fifteenth 
chapter of Numbers, saith, when any man is clothed with a 
fringe, and goeth out therewith to the door of his habitation, 
he is safe, and God rejoiceth, and the destroying angel de- 
parteth from thence, and that man shall be delivered from all 
hurt, and from all destruction.*" 

Concerning the form of this fringe, we can only frame an 
Uncertain guess from the two Hebrew words by which it is 
expressed, namely, J"W2f tsitsith, Numb. xv. 38, 39, and 
D^*U gedhilim, Deut. xxii. 12; which is likewise rendered by 
the Chaldee Paraphrast ^"fDDHD cheruspedhin. The former, 
tsitsith, is used for a lock of hair, Ezek. viii. 3 ; the latter for 
a rope, such as Dalilah bound Samson with ; Judges xvi. 
11, 12. From hence it is inferred, that these fringes consisted 
of many threads, which hung like hair, and were twisted like 
a rope. It was also ordered by the law, that they should put 
upon the fringe a riband of blue, or a thread, as the word 
SnD pathil seems to be properly rendered in a passage of the 
book of Judges, where it is said concerning Samson, that 
he "broke the withs," with which he was bound, "as a 
thread, b+f)B pethil, of tow is broken when it toucheth the 
fire," chap. xvi. 9 ; or else it may signify lace, as it is ren- 
dered in a passage of the book of Exodus, chap, xxxix. 31, 
where the string, which fastened the holy crown to the high- 
priest's mitre, is expressed by the same word used for this 
blue thread, or lace, upon the fringe of their garments. 
Whether, therefore, it was a blue thread twisted with a white 

* R* Menachem on Numb, xv., quoted by Ainsworth on Numb. xv. 39 



CHAP. X.] 



OF THE PHARISEES. 



311 



through the whole fringe ; whether it was a blue lace, by which 
the fringe was fastened to the edge of the garment ; or whether 
it was sewed along the head of the fringe, — is what we cannot 
take upon us to determine. 

The use of this fringe is said to be, " that they might look 
upon it, and remember all the commandments of the Lord, 
and do them;" Numb. xv. 39. Some conceive the fringe was 
to be a distinguishing badge, which God ordered the people 
of Israel to wear on their clothes, in the nature of a livery, 
that they might be known for his servants, who was not 
ashamed to own them for his peculiar people ; as he had be- 
fore, for the same purpose, ordered them to wear a distinguish- 
ing mark in their flesh, namely, circumcision. This account 
well agrees with the reason given for their wearing the fringe, 
" that they might look upon it, and remember all the com- 
mandments of the Lord, to do them that is, that it might re- 
mind them, that as the servants of Jehovah, whose livery they 
wore, they were bound to do all that he had commanded 
them. And as by this badge they were to be distinguished 
from the servants of all other gods, so it was to be a guard 
upon them from idolatry ; accordingly it follows, " that ye 
seek not after your own hearts, and your own eyes, after which 
you used to go a whoring." 

Le Clerc* indeed suggests, that the Jews borrowed this 
fashion of wearing fringes from the Egyptians, because He- 
rodotus, speaking of the Egyptians, says, ev^SvKam k&wvciq 
Xivtovg irepi ra victXea Svaaavwrovg, induli sunt tunicis lineis 
circa crura fimbratis. J y But why might it not as well be 
supposed, the Egyptians learnt it from the Jews, as the Jews 
from the Egyptians ? 

After all, there are some, Calvin in particular,;}; who suppose 
these fringes to be nothing but strings, with tassels, at the four 
corners of their upper garment, which was made of a square 
piece of cloth, in the same fashion that was afterward worn by 
the Greeks and Romans. 

* Clerici Annot. in Num. xv. 38. 

t Herodot. Euterp. cap. lxxxi. p. 118, edit. Gronov. Lugd. Bat. 1716. 
X Calvini Comment, in Deut xxii. 12, Oper. torn. I p. 522, Amste!^ 
1671. 



312 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 



This opinion very well agrees with the precept in Deu- 
teronomy, " Thou shalt make thee fringes upon the four 
quarters," wings, as the margin renders it, or rather corners, 
ft of thy vesture, wherewith thou coverest thyself ;" chap. xxii. 
12. And the proper use of these strings was to tie the 
corners together. Such strings the modern Jews have to their 
veils, and each string has five knots in it, besides the tassel, 
signifying the five books of the law. The rabbies observe, 
that each string consists of eight threads, which, added to five, 
the number of knots, and likewise to the numeral value of the 
letters in the word JT»2^2f tsitsith, amounts to six hundred and 
thirteen, the number, according to them, of the precepts of the 
law. From hence they infer the importance of the command 
concerning the rW2f tsitsith; he who observes it, they say, in 
effect observing the whole law.* 

The Pharisees are censured by our Saviour for enlarging 
these fringes of their garments, which we may suppose they 
did partly from pride and partly from hypocrisy, as pretending 
thereby an extraordinary regard for the law. It is reported by 
Jerome, as quoted by Godwin, that they used to have fringes 
extravagantly long, sticking thorns in them, that, by pricking 
their legs as they walked, they might put them in mind of the 
law.f 

From the same corrupt fountain whence we have derived 
the other superstitions and corruptions of the Pharisees, even 
their attachment to the traditions, we may also trace their 
most unreasonable and malicious opposition to our Saviour. 
For, having learnt to interpret the prophecies of the Messiah 
in a carnal sense, and being strongly tinctured with the notion 
of his being designed to be a temporal prince and deliverer, 
no miracles could overcome their prejudices against the mean- 
ness of Christ's appearance, and persuade them that a person 

* Buxtorf. Synag. Jud. cap. ix. p. 164, edit. 3, Basil. 1661; et Lex. Tal- 
mud, in voc. JT^lf . 

f Concerning the fringes, see Ainsworth on Numb. xv. 38, 39, Deut. 
xxii. 12; Buxtorfii Synag. Judaic, cap. ix. p. 160 — 170; et Lexic. Talmud, 
in voc. JT>2fV2f ; Drusius de Sectis Judaeor. lib. ii. cap. xvi. p. 267, edit. 
Trigland; et Leusden. Philolog. Hebraeo-Mixt. dissert, xvii. p. 118, 119, 
fcdit. 2, Ultraject. 1682. 



CHAP. X.J 



OF THE PHARISEES. 



who made no pretence to civil authority and military power, 
could possibly be " Messiah the prince," the " son of David, 
and the Saviour of Israel." They got him, therefore, appre- 
hended, condemned, and executed, as an impostor.* 

* See an account of the Pharisees in Drusius de Tribus Sectis Judasorum, 
lib. ii. cap. xii. ult.; in Lightfoot, Horae Hebr. Matt. iii. 7; in Basnage's 
History of the Jews, book ii. chap. x. xi. \ in Clerici Ecclesiast. Histor. Pro- 
legom. sect. i. cap. ii. p. 5 — 12; and in Prideaux's Connect, part. ii. book v, 
vol. iii. p. 479 — 483, edit. 10. 



CHAPTER XI. 



OF THE SADDUCEES AND SAMARITANS. 

As for the Sadducees, Epiphanius derives the name from 
p*7¥ tsedhek, justitia ; # but that derivation neither suits the 
word Sadducee, nor the true character of the sect. For so 
far were they from being eminently righteous, that they are 
commonly said to be the most wicked and profligate of all the 
Jews ; neither were they given to boast of their own righteous- 
ness, as the Pharisees were. 

Another etymology, which Theophylact mentions together 
with the former,^ is therefore esteemed to be the more pro- 
bable one, that their name was derived awo aipemapxov SciSwk. 
This he borrowed from the Talmud, which tells us, that Sadoc 
was a scholar of Antigonus Sochaeus, president of the San- 
hedrim about two hundred and sixty years before Christ j who 
having inculcated upon his scholars, that they ought to serve 
God out of pure love to him, and not in a servile manner, either 
for fear of punishment or hope of reward ; Sadoc, not under- 
standing this spiritual doctrine, concluded there was no future 
state of rewards and punishments, and accordingly taught and 
propagated that error after his master's death.! However 
that be (for I must confess with me talmudical stories have 
but little credit), this is said to have been the doctrine of the 
Sadducees. That they denied the resurrection, and that there 
are angels and spirits, appears from the account given of 
them in the New Testament: Matt. xxii. 23; Acts xxiii. 8. 
According to Josephus, they rejected the traditions of the 

* Epiphan. adversus Haeres. lib. i. haeres. xiv. p. 31, C. edit. Petav. 
Colon. 1682. 

f Theophylact. Comment, in Matt. hi. 7, p. 18. 

I Mishn. tit. Pirke Abhoth, cap. i. sect. iii. et Maimon. in loc. See 
Lightfoot, Horas Hebraicae, in Acts xxiii. 8. 



CHAP. XI.] 



OF THE SADDUCEES. 



315 



Pharisees;* they not only denied the resurrection of the body, 
but the life and existence of the soul after death : they like- 
wise denied all divine decrees, and held that man was abso- 
lutely master of his own actions, with a full freedom to do 
cither good or evil, as he thought proper; that God did not 
influence him in doing either; and that his prosperity or 
adversity are placed within his own power, and are respectively 
the effect of his wisdom or his folly ;f a notion which in ef- 
fect amounts to denying a providence, and to the subversion 
of all religion ; so that they were, upon the whole, Epicurean 
Deists in all other respects, except that they acknowledged 
the world to have been created, and perhaps to be upheld and 
preserved by God. This historian gives them a very bad cha- 
racter as to their morals, and says, " they were a set of men 
churlish and morose toward each other, and cruel and savage 
to all besides. "J However, we must remember, that Jo- 
sephus himself was a Pharisee, of an opposite sect, and that 
such persons are very apt, from their mutual aversion, to mis- 
represent and calumniate each other. Perhaps his account of 
the Sadducees is not without some tincture of pharisaical mis- 
representation ; for it can hardly be supposed, that men of 
such very corrupt principles, as he represents them, should 
continue uncensured and uncondemned by the Sanhedrim, 
much less be suffered to fill the highest posts in church and 
state, as we find they did ; it appearing that Caiaphas, the 
high-priest, who condemned our Saviour, was of this sect; 
Acts v. 17. Besides, the character given them by this his- 
torian is altogether inconsistent with their receiving, which all 
admit they did, the five books of Moses, even though it were 
true that they rejected all the other sacred books, which 
Godwin lays to 'their charge, but from which Scaliger en- 
deavours to exculpate them.§ Indeed, the silence of Jose- 
phus renders this charge upon them justly suspected; for 
though he often mentions them, and loads them with imputa- 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. x. sect. vi. p. 663 ; lib. xviii. cap. i. sect, 
iv. p. 71, edit. Haverc. 

f Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. iv. p. 871; De Bello Judaic, lib. ii, 
cap. viii. sect. xiv. p. 166; Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. v. sect. ix. p. 649. 

X De Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. xiv. p. 166. 

§ Elench. Trihaeres, cap. xvi. 



3W 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



tions of many corrupt principles and practices, yet he never 
speaks of their rejecting any part of the holy Scriptures, which 
no doubt he would have done, if it had been fact. Nay, he 
says, that though they rejected the traditions of the fathers, 
they received ra ysy pajuLfiiva, the written books,* an expres- 
sion too general, and too much in their favour, to have flowed 
from his pen, if he could with any plausibility have accused 
them of rejecting any one of them. And even in the Talmud 
the Sadducees are introduced as disputing and arguing from 
passages in the prophets, and the Pharisees as answering them 
from the same books,f which implies, that those books were 
received by them; nor are they ever accused by any of the 
ancient rabbies with rejecting them. Some of them, indeed, 
style them D^rrD chuthiim, which is another name for the Sa- 
maritans. But, perhaps, that was only as a term of reproach, 
which the Jews bestowed upon those whom they hated, as 
upon our Saviour, who, they said, was " a Samaritan, and 
had a devil ;" John viii. 48. However, the Samaritans ad- 
mitting only the five books of Moses to be canonical, hence it 
hath come to pass, that the Sadducees being by the rabbies 
sometimes styled D^DD chuthiim, or Samaritans, hath been the 
occasion, without sufficient reason, of the Sadducees being 
supposed, as well as the Samaritans, to have rejected all the 
writings of the Old Testament except those of Moses. Sca- 
liger's opinion seems to be more probable, that they did not 
reject the prophets and the hagiographa, but only expounded 
them in a different sense from the Pharisees and other Jews. :£ 
It is a question of some difficulty, how the Sadducees could 

* Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. x> sect. vi. p. 663. Aeyov tKuva dsiv fjyeiaO aivo- 
fiiKa ra yty pafifxeva, ra ft £K Trapadorrttog rwf 7rarspojv [ir\ rrjpuv. The word 
vofwca is here applied to ra yzypa^ntva, the whole Scripture, as opposed to 
tradition ; and the word vofnov seems to be used in the same comprehensive 
sense, lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. iv. p. 871. 

f Cod. Sanhedrin, cap. Chelek, ab init. ; Vid. Reland. Antiq. part ii. 
cap. ix. sect. x. p. 273, edit. 3 ; Sadducaei testimonium citant contra resur- 
rectionem ex Job vii. 9, in Ilmedenu, fol. ii. col. iv,, inquit Drusius, de Tri- 
bus Sectis Judasor. lib. iii. cap. ix. in margin. See especially Lightfoot, 
Horse Hebraic. John iv. 25. 

X Scaliger, ubi supra; Drusius de Tribus Sectis Judaeor. lib. iii. cap. ix.; 
et Respons. ad Serar. Minerv. lib. ii. cap. xi. ; Reland. Antiq. part ii. cap. 
ix. sect. x. p. 273. 



CHAP. XI.] 



OF THE SAMARITANS. 



317 



disbelieve the existence of angels, and yet receive even the 
five books of Moses as canonical Scripture, wherein are so 
many narratives of the appearance of angels. Probably thei? 
opinion concerning angels was, that they were not permanent 
beings, but temporary phantoms, formed by the divine power 
for particular purposes, and dissipated again when these were 
answered. 

In the time of Josephus this sect was not large, but it is 
said to be the richest, and that those of the greatest quality 
and opulence generally belonged to it ;* which we can easily 
credit, as we observe in our day, that the great and rich are 
apt to prefer the pleasure and grandeur of this life to any ex- 
pectancy in a future ; and greedily to embrace such doctrines 
as tend to encourage their luxury and sensuality, by ridding 
their minds of uneasy reflections on the judgment-day and 
world to come.f 

Of the Samaritans. 

With the Sadducees Godwin joins the Samaritans, with 
whom he says they have a near affinity; that is, on supposi- 
tion of their rejecting all the sacred writings but the five 
books of Moses, which Origen,J Jerome,^ and Epiphanius|| 
say the Samaritans did. 

The Samaritans were originally heathens, consisting of 
persons of several nations, to whom the king of Assyria gave 
the cities and lands of the Israelites upon the Assyrian cap- 
tivity. They were called Samaritans from the city Samaria, 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiii. cap. x. sect. vi. p. 663; lib. xviii. cap. i. sect, 
iv. p. 871. 

f See an account of the Sadducees, not only in the authors before cited, 
but in Le Clerc's Histor. Eccles. Prolegom. sect. i. cap. iii. p. 12 — 15; Bas- 
nage's History of the Jews, book ii. chap. vi. vii. ; Bayle's Dictionary, 
article Sadducees ; and Lightfoot, Horae Hebr. Matt. iii. 7. 

X Origen. contra Celsum, lib. i. p. 38, edit. Cantab. 1677; Comment, in 
Johan. apud Comment, in Scripturas, part, posterior, p. 218, edit. Huet. 
Colon. 1685. 

§ Hieron. in Dialogo adversus Luciferianos, as quoted by Prideaux, 
part i. book vi. anno 409 ante Christum, vol. ii. p. 597. 

j| Epiphan. adversus Haeres. lib. i. haeres. ix. Samarit. sect. ii. torn. i. p. 
24, edit. Petav. Colon. 1682. 



318 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



the metropolis of the kingdom of Israel. When they first 
settled in the country, they practised only the idolatrous rites 
of the several nations from whence they came; but upon being 
infested with lions, which they supposed a judgment upon 
them for not paying due honour to the ancient god of the 
country, the king of Assyria sent a Jewish priest to instruct 
them in the worship of Jehovah ; upon which, out of the 
several customs and modes of worship of the nations to which 
they belonged, and the rites of the worship of Jehovah, they 
made up a very motley religion ; 2 Kings xvii. 24, et seq. 
Upon the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity, 
and the rebuilding Jerusalem and the temple, the religion of 
the Samaritans received another alteration on the following 
occasion. One of the sons of Jehoiada, the high-priest, whom 
Josephus calls Manasseh, # married the daughter of Sanballal 
the Horonite ; but the law of God having forbidden the inter- 
marriages of the Israelites with any other nation, Nehemiah 
set himself to reform this corruption, which had spread into 
many Jewish families, and obliged all that had taken strange 
wives immediately to part with them ; Nehem. xiii. 23 — 30. 
Manasseh, unwilling to quit his wife, fled to Samaria, and 
many others, who were in the same case with him, being also 
of the same mind, went and settled under the protection of 
Sanballat, governor of Samaria. From that time the worship 
of the Samaritans came much nearer to that of the Jews ; and 
they afterward obtained leave of Alexander the Great to build 
a temple on mount Gerizim, near the city Samaria, in imita- 
tion of the temple at Jerusalem, where they practised the 
same forms of worship. It is very common for people, who 
are nearly, but not entirely of the same religion, to have a 
greater aversion to one another, than those whose sentiments 
and forms of worship are more different. So it was with the 
Jews and Samaritans. Hence it was the highest term of re- 
proach among the Jews to call a person a Samaritan, as was 
before observed ; and so great was their mutual animosity, 
that they would neither ask nor receive any favours from each 
other. The woman of Samaria, therefore, wondered that 
Christ, (< being a Jew, would ask drink of her who was a Sa- 
maritan John iv. 9. And when our Lord had occasion to 
* Joseph, Antiq. lib. xi. cap, viii. sect, i, ii.p. 578, 579. 



CHAP. XI.] 



OF THE SAMARITANS. 



319 



pass through Samaria, as he was going to Jerusalem to keep 
one of the annual feasts at the temple, the Samaritans would 
give him no entertainment on his journey, not merely because 
he was a Jew, but because, designing to keep the feast at Je- 
rusalem, he plainly preferred that temple above theirs; Luke ix. 
52, 53. As to what Godwin advances, that the Samaritans 
allowed of no commerce with the Jews, which he grounds on 
the forecited passage, concerning the surprise of the woman of 
Samaria, that Christ, being a Jew, asked drink of her, who 
was a Samaritan; and its being added as the reason of this, 
" for the Jews have no dealings with ov (jvyxpuvrai, the Sa- 
maritans, John iv. 9 ; — I say, the opinion, that the Samaritans 
permitted no kind of commerce with the Jews, is evidently 
confuted by our being informed, that while this conversation 
passed between our Saviour and the woman, H the disciples 
were gone into the city" of Samaria, " to buy meat;" ver. 8. 
Nothing can be meant, therefore, by ov avyxpuvrai, but that 
they would have no friendly intercourse, nor perform acts of 
mutual civility . # 

* See, concerning the Samaritans, Reland. Dissertat. Miscellan. vol. ii 
dissert, vii. de Samaritanis ; Prideaux's Connect, part i. book vi. sub anno 
409 ante Christum. 



CHAPTER XII. 



OF THE ESSENES. 

Th e Essenes, though no notice is taken of them, at least 
by name, in any part of the Scripture history, were yet a con- 
siderable sect among the Jews, of whom both Josephus and 
Philo have given a large account ; the former in the twelfth 
chapter of his second book of the Jewish war, where he pro- 
fessedly treats of the three principal sects of the Jews, the 
Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes. He likewise 
speaks of them occasionally in several other parts of his works. 
Philo, in his book entitled Omnis probus Liber* gives a 
very particular account of the dogmata and manners of this 
sect, nearly, though not quite, the same with that of Josephus. 
It is very possible there might be some little difference be- 
tween the Essenes in Egypt and those in Judea ; and Philo, 
who was an Alexandrian Jew, was acquainted only with the 
former; Josephus, an inhabitant of Judea, only with the latter. 
Pliny, the natural historian, hath left us some account of the 
Essenes in the seventeenth chapter of the fifth book of his 
history .f 

These are the only ancient writers who speak of the Esse- 
nes, on whose narratives, as they were cotemporary with 
them, we may depend. As for what Epiphanius, and other 
ancient and modern authors have said of them, it can only 
be by conjecture, any farther than they have taken their 
materials from those above-mentioned. 

The etymology of the name has given grammarians and 
critics no little trouble. Josephus is silent upon it. Philo 
derives it from ocriog, holy, because of the extraordinary sanc- 
tity of the Essenes, though he confesses that derivation is not 

* See also Philo de Vita Contemplative. 

f The several accounts are inserted at large in Dr. Prideaux's Connect, 
part ii. book v. sub fin. 



CHAP. XII.] OF THE ESSENES. 321 

grammatical.* Epiphanius goes the farthest for the etymo- 
logy of any, deriving the name from Jesse, the father of Da- 
vid, f Salmasius fetches it from a city called Essa, mentioned 
by Josephus, from whence he imagines this sect first sprung. J 
Serarius hath given us, at least, a dozen different etymolo- 
gies. § So various and uncertain are the conjectures of the 
learned on this subject. 

Godwin derives it from the Syriac word NDK asa, which 
signifies to heal or cure, because Philo calls those of the 
Essenes, who devoted themselves to a contemplative life, Oepa- 
7T£VTai, iherapeutcc, which is naturally derived from Oepaireveiv, 
sanare ; yet not, as Godwin erroneously says, because they 
studied physic, according to the common acceptation of that 
word ; but because, saith Philo, they cure men's souls of 
those diseases which they have contracted by their passions 
and vices. Or otherwise, as he adds, they have this name, 
because they have learnt to worship and serve that Being, 
who is better than good, more uncompounded than the num- 
ber one, and more ancient than unity itself :|| for the word 
OtpaTTEvrrig signifies a worshipper, or servant, as well as a 
physician. ^[ 

These therapeutcc are distinguished from those whom Philo 
calls Practical Essenes, who were employed in the labours of 
husbandry and other mechanic arts ; though only in such as 
belonged to peace, for none of them would ever put their 
hands to the making swords or arrows, or any other instru- 
ments of war. ## 

Both Josephus and Philo give a surprising account of their 

* Philo in tractat. Omnis probus Liber, Oper. p. 678, C. Colon. Allobr. 
1613; vid. Serar. Trihaeres. lib. iii. cap. i. p. 109 ; J. Scaliger. Elench. Tri- 
haeres. Serar. cap. xviii. in init. 

t Epiphan. Haeres. xix. lib. i. torn. ii. sect iv. p. 120, edit. Petav. 

% Salmas. Plinian. exercitat. in Solinum, cap. xxxv. p. 432, edit. Ultraject. 

§ Serar. Trihaeres. Judaeor. lib. iii. cap. i. p. 106 — 110, edit. Trigland. 
1703. 

|| Philo de Vita Contemplative, ab init. Oper. p. 688, B, C ; Valesius, in 
his notes on Eusebius's Eccles. Histor. lib. ii. cap. xvii. p. 66, not. 3, en- 
deavours to prove, against Scaliger, that the Therapeutae, so largely described 
by Philo, are not to be reckoned in the number of the Essenes. 

% Vid. Lexic. Constantin. in verb. 

** Philo Tractat. quod Omnis probus Liber, Oper. p. 678, E, D. 

Y 



322 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book T. 



austere way of life. Their houses were mean; their clothes 
made of wool without any dye ; they never changed their 
clothes or shoes, till they were quite worn out : their food was 
plain and coarse, and their drink water : they neglected all 
bodily ornaments, and would by no means anoint themselves 
with oil, according to the fashion of those times. Nay, if 
any one of them happened to be anointed against his will, he 
would presently wipe off" the oil, and wash himself, as from 
some pollution. They lived in sodalities, and had all their 
goods in common ; their morals were very exact and pure, 
and they kept the sabbath more strictly than any of the 
Jews.* 

In the account which Godwin gives of the dogmata of this 
sect, collected from Josephus and Philo, he asserts, that the 
Pythagoreans forbad oaths, and so, saith he, did the Essenes .+ 
But this, I apprehend, is a mistake as to the Pythagoreans, 
and perhaps, also, as to the Essenes. The former, it is well 
known, used an oath on important occasions, and held it to be 
most sacred ; swearing by the number four, which they wrote 
by ten dots, in the form of a triangle ; so that each side con- 

• 

sisted of four dots, thus : Some have imagined Py- 

thagoras took the hint of this from the Nomen Tetragramma- 
ton of the Jews ; % and that, having likewise acquired some 
notion of the Trinity, he intended to express it by the triangle, 
which is called his Trigonon Mysticum. 

As for the Essenes, Josephus saith, that before any are ad- 
mitted to eat at the common table, they bind themselves by 
solemn oath to observe the rules of the society. § 

Godwin likewise maintains, that the Pythagoreans used 

* Philo, ubi supra, p. 678 — 680 ; Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. 
viii. sect. ii. — xiii. p. 160 — 165. 

f Joseph, de Bell. Jud. ubi supra, sect, vi.; Philo, ubi supra, p. 679, C. 

\ Diog. Laert. in Vita Pythag. lib. viii. segm. xxxiii.; Lucian. Dialog. 
Vitarum Auctio, Oper. torn. iii. p. 103, cum Annot. Cognati, p. 131, edit. 
Basil.; et Galei Philosoph. General, lib. ii. cap. iii. sect. ii. p. 173. 175. 

§ Joseph, de Bell, ubi supra, sect. vii. p. 163. In the former passage, 
sect, vi., his expression is, to de Ofxvveiv avroig TrepuaTarai, %eipov ti ttjq 
eiriopxiag viroXapL^avovreg, though here he saith, rrpiv de rrjg icoivtjg aij/aaSai 
rpo<prjg, opicovg avroig ofxvvvi (ppiiaodeig, k. t. X. And in sect. viii. he speaks 
of them as roig opKoig kcli roig eSeai evdede/jievoi, and the like in other places. 



CHAP. XII.] 



OF THE ESSENES. 



323 



only inanimate sacrifices ; and so, saith he, did the Essenes ; 
they sent gifts to the temple, but did not sacrifice. But how 
will this account of the Pythagoreans agree with the story 
mentioned by Diogenes Laertius and others,* that Pythagoras 
himself sacrificed a hecatomb, upon his discovering what is 
called the Pythagoric theorem, namely, that in a right-angled 
triangle, the square of the hypothenuse is equal to the sum of 
the squares of the sides ? As for the Essenes, it is not easy 
to reconcile their not using animal sacrifices with the profound 
veneration which they professed for the five books of Moses, 
in which so many animal sacrifices are enjoined. Josephus 
indeed saith, they send their gifts, avaSrifiara, to the temple, 
but offer no sacrifices there, by reason of the different rules of 
purity which they have instituted among themselves. And 
therefore, being excluded the common temple, they sacrifice 
apart by themselves ; rag Svaiag tmreXovcri : the word Svaiag 
imports animal sacrifices that were slain .f 

3dly. Godwin saith, the Essenes worship toward the rising 
sun ; and this he grounds on a passage in Josephus ; on the 
authority of which some have charged them with worshipping 
the sun itself. The words are, Tlpog ye fii]v ro Qeiov iSiojg 
Evaefieig' irpiv yap avaa\eiv rov 'HAtov, ovBev Seyyovrai rwv 
fiefir]\u)V, irarpiovg de nvag etg avrov tv\ag, wairep iKerevovreg 
avareiXai.% If HAtov, indeed, be the antecedent to avrov, it 
must imply that they prayed to the sun itself. But this is 
not necessarily the construction ; for though to Qeiov, which 
is of the neuter gender, cannot be the antecedent to avrov, 

* Diog. Laert. de Vitis Philosophorum, lib. viii. Vit. Pythagor. segm. xii. 
p. 497, Amstel. 1692. Cicero represents Cotta as giving no credit to this 
story, because, as he apprehends, Pythagoras never used animal sacrifices ; 
Cicer. de Natura Deorum, lib. iii. cap. xxxvi. But it is related also by 
Athenseus, Deipnosoph. lib. x. p. 418, F, edit. Casaub. 1598. See also 
Plutarch, in Comment, non posse suaviter Vivi secundum Epicur. Oper. 
torn. ii. p. 1094, B, Francof. 1620. 

f Joseph. Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. v. p. 871. Yet Dr. Ibbotson (see 
his note in loc.) renders the word, t^' avrwv rag Srvmag tTrirtkovai, very 
differently from the translation used above, which is that of Dr. Prideaux : 
his version is, " in seipsis sacrificia peragunt, i. e. sese ipsos Deo vovebant 
et consecrabant," edit. Haverc. 

X Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. v. p. 161, 162, 

Y 2 



324 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



yet avrov may very well be supposed to agree with Qtov un- 
derstood. * Accordingly, Dr. Prideaux translates the words 
thus, " They are, in whatever pertaineth to God, in an especial 
manner religious ; for before the sun is risen, they speak of no 
common worldly matter, but till then offer up unto God their 
prayers in ancient forms, received from their predecessors ; 
supplicating particularly in them, that he would make the sun 
to rise upon them." If this criticism be not admitted, it is 
nevertheless much more easy to suppose an error in the copy, 
avrov for avTo, than that the Essenes, who had a more than 
ordinary zeal for the law of Moses, should be guilty of such 
gross idolatry as to worship the sun. 

There was a notion first started by Eusebius,f and eagerly 
embraced by many Roman Catholics,;}; that the Therapeutae 
were Christian ascetics or monks, converted and instituted by 
St. Mark : which improbable suggestion Godwin refutes by 
the following arguments : In Philo's treatise concerning the 
Therapeutae, or de Vita Contemplativa, there is no mention 
of Christ or Christians, the evangelists or apostles. Again, 
the Therapeutae are not mentioned as a new sect, as the 
Christians then were ; on the contrary, he styles their doctrine 
" a philosophy derived to them by tradition from their fore- 
fathers ;" and saith, ' 'they have the commentaries of the 
ancients, who were the authors of this sect."§ Again, the 
inscription of Philo's treatise is not only napi (3iov ZewpriTiKov, 
but also 7TF/K iketojv aparwv, and Philo elsewhere calling the 
whole Jewish nation ikztikov yzvog,\\ it may from hence be 
inferred, that the Therapeutae were Jews, not Christians.^ 
However, it is not impossible, that some of these Jewish The- 
rapeutae, becoming Christians, might still affect their former 

* See Waehneri Antiquitates Ebseor. vol. ii. sect. vii. cap. v. sect. lxii. 
p. 775, 776, Gottingse, 1742. 

f Euseb. Eccles. Histor. lib. ii. cap. xvii. p. 66, ad fin. capitis. 

| Seraii Trihseres. lib. iii. cap. xvii. 

§ Philo de Vita Contemplativa, Oper. p. 691, C. 

|| Philo de Legation, sect. iii. cap. xvii. ad Caium, ab init. 

1T See this opinion of Eusebius well confuted likewise by Valesius, 
Euseb. Eccles. Hist. lib. ii. cap. xvii. p. 68, not. 1. edit. Reading, Cantab. 
1720, and by Scaliger in his Elenchus Trihseres. Seraii, cap. xxix. 



CHAP. XII.] 



OF THE ESSENE 



325 



recluse way of living, and, being imitated by others, might 
^ive the first occasion to monkery among Christians. 

We have no guide to enable us to discover the origin of 
this sect. Pliny, indeed, saith, though we know not upon 
what authority, that it had subsisted for several thousand 
years.* The most probable opinion is, that it begun a little 
before the time of the Maccabees, when the faithful Jews 
were forced to fly from the cruel persecutions of their enemies 
into deserts and caves ; and by living in those retreats, many 
of them being habituated to retirement, which thereby became 
most agreeable to them, they chose to continue it, even when 
they.might have appeared upon the public stage again, and 
accordingly formed themselves into recluses. As to the num- 
bers of which this sect consisted, Philo and Josephus agree, 
that in Judea there were about four thousand : but in Egypt 
Philo makes the number of them to be much larger .f 

The absolute silence of the evangelical history concerning 
the Essenes is by some accounted for from their eremetic life, 
which secluded them from places of public resort; so that 
they did not come in the way of our Saviour, as the Pharisees 
and Sadducees often did. 

Others are of opinion, that the Essenes, being very honest 
and sincere, without guile or hypocrisy, gave no room for the 
reproofs and censures which the other Jews deserved ; and 
therefore no mention is made of them. 

But though they are not expressly mentioned in any of the 
sacred books, it is supposed, and not without reason, that 
they are referred to by St. Paul, in the second chapter of his 
Epistle to the Colossians ; <( Let no man," saith he, " beguile 
you of your reward, in a voluntary humility, and worshipping of 
angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, 
vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind : which things have in- 
deed a show of wisdom, in will-worship and humility, and neg- 
lecting of the body ;" chap. ii. 18. 23. What is here said 
of a voluntary humility, and neglecting the body, is in a pe- 
culiar manner applicable to the Essenes ; and by Josephus 
it appears, that they had something peculiar among them re- 

* Plin. Histor. Natur. lib. v. cap. xvii. — 

f Philo in Tractat. quod Omnis probus Liber, Oper. p. 678, C ; et de 
Vita Contemplative, p. 690, E ; Joseph. Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. v. 



326 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK I. 



lating to the angels ; for he saith, " that when they received 
any into their number, they made them solemnly swear, that 
they would keep and observe the books of the sect, and the 
names of the angels, with care."* What is said of " in- 
truding into things not seen," is likewise agreeable to the cha- 
racter of the therapeutic Essenes, who, placing the excellence 
of their contemplative life in raising their minds to invisible 
objects, pretended to such a degree of abstraction and eleva- 
tion, as to be able to dive into the nature of angels, and assign 
them proper names, or rightly interpret those already given 
them ; and likewise to pry into futurity, and foretell things to 
come.f Upon which it is highly probable, " they were 
vainly puffed up by their fleshly mind." Moreover, the dog- 
mata to which St. Paul refers in the following words, " Touch 
not, taste not, handle not," ver. 21, are such as the Essenes 
held, who would not taste any pleasant food, but lived upon 
coarse bread, and drank nothing but water ;J and some of 
them would not taste any food at all till after sun-set ;§ and 
who, if they were touched by any that were not of their own 
sect, would wash themselves, as after some great pollution. || 
Perhaps there might be a sodality of Essenes at Colosse, as 
there were in many other places out of Judea ; and that some 
of the Christians, too much inclined to Judaism, might also 
affect the peculiarities of this sect ; which might be the reason 
of the apostle's so particularly cautioning against them.^f 

* Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. vii. sub. fin. p. 163. 

f Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. xii. p. 165. 

t Philo de Vita Contemplative, p. 692, B, p. 696, D. 

§ Philo, ubi supra, p. 692, A. 

|| Joseph, ubi supra, sect. x. p. 164. 

Concerning the Essenes, besides the references above, see Serarii Tri- 
hseresis, Drusius de Tribus Sectis Judseor. ; Scaliger's Elenchus Trihaeres. 
Serarii; Clerici Prolegom. ad Histor. Eccles. sect i. cap. iv. v. p. 16 — 29 ; 
and Basnage's History of the Jews, book ii. chap. xii. xiii. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



OF THE GAULONITES AND HERODIANS. 

The Gaulonites were not a religious sect, but a political 
faction, raised up and headed by Judas of Galilee, who is 
mentioned in the fifth chapter of the Acts; ver. 37. Josephus 
calls him lovSag TavXaviTrjg in the first chapter of the eighteenth 
book of his Antiquities;* yet in the title or contents of that 
chapter, and in the fifth chapter of the twentieth book, he is 
styled lovSag rov TakiXaiov.f Judas the Gaulonite, therefore, 
and Judas of Galilee were the same person, indifferently 
called by one or the other of those names, because Gaulona, 
his native country, which lay beyond Jordan, was otherwise 
called Galilee, or Galilee of the Gentiles, Matt. iv. 15, 
et alibi, to distinguish it from the other Galilee on this side 
Jordan. 

This Judas, it seems, had raised and headed an insurrection 
against the Roman government, on occasion of the tax which 
Augustus levied on Judea, when he reduced it into the form 
of a Roman province .J This party was soon suppressed, 
and we read no more of it in the New Testament ; unless, 
perhaps, as Godwin conjectures, those persons were some of 
this faction, otherwise called Galileans, whom Pilate slew as 
they were performing the sacred rites at the altar, and there- 
by mingled their blood with their sacrifices; Luke xiii. L 

As for the Herodians, they are passed over in silence both 
by Josephus and Philo, and only known by being mentioned in 
three passages of the New Testament history. We find them 
combined with the Pharisees in endeavouring to entangle our 
Saviour with that ensnaring question, " Whether it was law- 
ful to give tribute to Caesar;" Matt. xxii. 16, 17. We read 
of the Pharisees taking counsel with the Herodians against 

* Sect. i. p. 869, edit. Haverc. f Sect. ii. p. 965. 

% Joseph, de Bello Judaic, lib. ii. cap. viii. sect. i. p. 160; Antiq. lib. 
xvii. cap. ult. sect. ult. et lib. xviii. cap. i. sect. i. p. 867. 869, 870. 



328 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK J . 



Jesus, how they might destroy him, Mark iii. 6; and we hear 
our Lord charging his disciples to take heed and beware of 
the leaven of the Pharisees, and of Herod; which is com- 
monly understood of the sect of the Herodians, who derived 
their name from Herod; Mark viii. 15. This account of the 
Herodians is so concise, that it hath left room for almost 
numberless conjectures concerning them. 

Some make them to be a political party, others a religious 
sect. The first opinion is favoured by the Syriac version, 
which every where styles the Herodians, the domestics of 
Herod; and it is alleged, that the author of this version, as 
he was nearly cotemporary with them, had the best means of 
knowing who they were. It is likewise argued, that they 
could not be a religious sect, because Josephus, who pro- 
fessedly gives an account of the several religious sects of the 
Jews, neither on that occasion nor on any other makes any 
mention of the Herodians. On the other hand, in favour of 
the opinion that they were a religious sect, it is pleaded that 
our Saviour's cautioning his disciples against the leaven of 
Herod, implies, that the Herodians were distinguished from 
the other Jews by some doctrinal tenets, leaven being ex- 
plained by our Saviour himself to signify doctrine; see Matt, 
xvi. 6. 12. 

It is probable the truth lies between these two opinions, or 
rather comprehends them both. 

The notion, that the Herodians were a set of people who 
held Herod to be the Messiah, which is espoused by Ter- 
tullian, # Epiphanius,f Jerome, J Chrysostom,^ and Theo- 
phylact,|| among the ancients, and by Grotius,^[ as well as 
others, of the moderns, is without sufficient foundation, and 
highly improbable ; whether we understand it to be meant of 

* Tertullian. de Praescriptioue Haereticor. cap. xlv. sub fin. Oper. p. 219, 
B, edit. Rigalt. Paris, 1675. 

+ Epiphan. adversus Haereses, haeres. xx. sect. i. p. 45, edit. Petav. 
Colon. 1682. 

X Hieron. contra Luciferianos, cap. xvi., though in his Comment on 
Matt. xxii. 15, 16, he rejects this opinion. 
§ Chrysost. in Marc. xii. 13. 

|| Theophylact. in Matt. xxii. 16, p. 131, Paris, 1635. 
IT Grotius de Veritate Christian. Relig. lib. v. sect. xiv. sub fin. in not. et 
apud annot. in Matt. xvi. 6. 



CHAP. XIII.] OF THE H ERODIAN S. 



329 



Herod the Great, who died soon after our Saviour was born ; 
or of Herod Antipas, who reigned at the time of his personal 
ministry ; since neither of them were native Israelites, and it 
cannot well be supposed, that any Jews were so ignorant as 
to take a foreigner for the Messiah, who had been so ex- 
pressly promised them to be raised up among themselves, of 
the tribe of Judah, and of the house of David. Besides, 
supposing any of them had been so stupid as to apprehend the 
first Herod to be the Messiah, no doubt his death, to say 
nothing of his wicked and odious administration, would long 
since have convinced them of their mistake ; since he had 
been very far from accomplishing the deliverance of Israel 
from all oppression, which they expected from the Messiah. 
And as for the second Herod, his dominions were small, and 
his power little, in comparison with the former ; Judea now 
being reduced into the form of a Roman province ; so that 
he was little more than the procurator of Galilee, with the 
title only of king. It is therefore utterly inconceivable, that 
any should take him for the Messiah. 

The most probable opinion concerning the Herodians seems 
to be that of Dr. Prideaux, # that they derived their name 
from Herod the Great, and were distinguished from the Pha- 
risees and other Jews, by their falling in with Herod's scheme 
of subjecting himself and his dominions to the Romans, and 
likewise by complying with many of their heathen usages and 
customs. In their zeal for the Roman authority they were 
diametrically opposite to the Pharisees, who esteemed it un r 
lawful to submit, or pay taxes, to the Roman emperor ; a?! 
opinion which they grounded on their being forbidden by the 
law to set a stranger over them, who was not one of their 
own nation, as their king. The conjunction of the Herodians, 
therefore, with the Pharisees against Christ, is a memorable 
proof of the keenness of their resentment and malice against 
him ; especially, when we consider that they united together 
in proposing to him an ensnaring question on a subject which 
was the ground of their mutual dissension ; namely, whether 
it was lawful to pay tribute to Cassar ; and provided he an- 
swered in the negative, the Herodians would accuse him of 
treason against the state : and should he reply in the affirma- 
* Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book v. sub fin. 



330 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [. 



tive, the Pharisees were as ready to excite the people against 
him, as an enemy to their civil liberties and privileges. 

It is probable the Herodians were distinguished likewise 
by their compliance with some heathen idolatrous usages 
which Herod had introduced ; who, as Josephus saith, built 
a temple to Caesar near the head of the river Jordan,* erected 
a magnificent theatre at Jerusalem, instituted pagan games,f 
and placed a golden eagle over the gate of the temple of Je- 
hovah ;t and, as he elsewhere intimates, furnished the tem- 
ples which he reared in several places out of Judea, with 
images for idolatrous worship, in order to ingratiate himself 
with the emperor and the people of Rome ; though to the 
Jews he pretended, that he did it against his will, and in 
obedience to the imperial command. § This symbolizing with 
idolatry, upon views of interest and worldly policy, was pro- 
bably the leaven of Herod, which our Saviour cautioned his 
disciples against. 

It is farther probable, that the Herodians were chiefly of 
the sect of the Sadducees, who sat loosest to religion of all the 
Jews; since that which is called by St. Mark, chap. viii. ver. 
15, the leaven of Herod, is, in the parallel place in St. Mat- 
thew, chap. xvi. ver. 6, styled the leaven of the Sadducees. || 

* Antiq. lib. xv. cap. x. sect. iii. p. 776. 
f Cap. viii. sect. i. ii. p. 766. 

I De Bell. Judaic, lib. i. cap. xxxiii. sect, xxiii. p. 139. 
§ Antiq. lib. xv. cap. ix. sect. v. p. 772. 

|| See on this subject, Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book v. sub fin.; Bas- 
nage's History of the Jews, book ii. chap. xiv. 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



BOOK II. 

CONCERNING PLACES. 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



CHAPTER I. 

OF THE TABERNACLE AND TEMPLE. 

Having, in the last Book, given an account of the most 
remarkable civil and ecclesiastical persons, officers, and sects 
among the Jews, we now proceed to the consideration of the 
most eminent structures, or places, which were esteemed 
sacred, or held in high veneration amongst them. On this 
head, Godwin treats first of the tabernacle and temple, though 
indeed but imperfectly, especially of the former ; on the de- 
scription of whose structure and sumptuous furniture Moses 
has bestowed almost as many pages as he has lines on his 
account of the creation of the world ; no doubt because the 
tabernacle was a designed emblem of the blessings of the new 
creation, which far excelled those of the old ; or, as the 
apostle styles it, was "a figure for the time then present;" 
Heb. ix. 8, 9. 

We have an account of three public tabernacles before the 
building of Solomon's temple : — 

The first, which Moses erected for himself, }V-ntD31 venatah- 
lo, Exod. xxxiii. 7; and this the Septuagint calls rr\v GKr\vr\v 
avTov. In this tabernacle he gave audience, heard causes, and 
inquired of God; and perhaps, also, the public offices of reli- 
gious worship were performed in it for some time, and there- 
fore Moses styled it the tabernacle of the congregation. 

The second tabernacle was that which Moses built for God, 
by his express command, partly to be a palace of his presence 
as the king of Israel, chap. xl. 34, 35, and partly to be the 
medium of the most solemn public worship, which the people 
were to pay to him ; ver. 26 — 29. This tabernacle was erected 



334 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book II. 



on the first day of the first month of the second year of the 
Israelites' migration out of Egypt; ver. 2. 17. 

The third public tabernacle was that which David erected 
in his own city for the reception of the ark, when he received 
it from the house of Obededom : 2 Sam. vi. 17; 1 Chron 
xvi. 1. 

It is the second of these tabernacles we are now to treat of, 
called the tabernacle kclt ^o\r]v f by way of distinction and 
eminence. It was a moveable chapel, so contrived as to be 
taken to pieces and put together at pleasure, for the conve- 
nience of carrying it from place to place, during the wander- 
ing of the Israelites in the wilderness for forty years. 

The learned Spencer* has fetched this tabernacle, with all 
its furniture and appurtenances, from Egypt; suggesting, that 
Moses projected it after the fashion of some such structure, 
which he had observed in that country, and which was in use 
among other nations ; or at least that God directed it to be 
made with a view of indulging the Israelites in a compliance 
with their customs and modes of worship, so far as there was 
nothing in them directly sinful. And he quotes both sacred 
and profane writers to prove, that the heathens had such port- 
able temples, in which they deposited the most valuable sacred 
or religious utensils. Such a temple or tabernacle we read of 
in the prophecy of Amos : " Ye have borne the tabernacle of 
Moloch and Chiun, your images, the star of your god, which 
ye made to yourselves ;" chap. v. 26. It is indeed past dispute 
that the heathens had such tabernacles, as well as many other 
things, very like those of the Jews ; but that they had them 
before the Jews, and especially that God condescended so 
far to the humour of the Israelites as to introduce them into 
his own worship, is neither proved, nor is it probable. It is 
more likely, that the heathens took these things from the 
Jews, who had the whole of their religion immediately from 
God, than that the Jews, or rather that God, should take 
them from the heathens. Besides, this account of the origin 
of the Jewish tabernacle and its furniture evidently thwarts 
the account which the apostle gives of the typical design and 
use of them, in the ninth chapter of the Epistle to the He- 
brews. And farther, supposing those heathen tabernacles to 
* De Legibus Hebr. dissert, i. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TABERNACLE. 



335 



have been more ancient than that built by Moses by divine 
direction, yet, so far from there being any design of complying 
with the idolatrous heathen, the contrary rather appears, in 
that this tabernacle was ordered to be directly the reverse of 
theirs, both in its form and situation. In its form : for 
whereas the heathen tabernacles were carried about whole 
upon the shoulders of the priests, this was to be taken to 
pieces whenever it was to be removed. And as to the situa- 
tion : whereas it was the general practice of the heathens to 
worship with their faces toward the east, God directed his 
tabernacle to be so placed, that the people should worship 
toward the west ; for to that point the holy of holies stood, 
in which were the more special symbols of God's presence, 
and which the people were to face as they worshipped in the 
court at the east end of the tabernacle, where was the altar of 
their sacrifices, as will appear hereafter. This detects a mis- 
take of Godwin's, who makes our cathedral churches answer to 
the Jewish tabernacle or temple, the sanctuary resembling the 
body of the church, the sanctum sanctorum the choir, and the 
court round about the tabernacle the church-yard ; it being evi- 
dent, that the form of these churches, in which the choir or 
chancel is placed toward the east, is directly contrary to the 
Jewish tabernacle and temple, and it is borrowed from the 
heathens, who placed their vaiog to the east, and the irpovaiog 
to the west.*" That the heathen idolaters worshipped toward 
the east, appears from the following passage of the prophet 
Ezekiel : ' 'And he brought me into the inner court of the 
Lord's house ; and behold, at the door of the temple of the 
Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about five and 
twenty men, with their backs toward the temple of the Lord, 
and their faces toward the east, and they worshipped the sun 
toward the east;" chap. viii. 16. And from Virgil, who, 
giving an account of iEneas's sacrificing before the battle with 
Turn us, saith, 

Illi ad surgentem conversi lumina solem, 
Dant fruges manibus salsas, et tempora ferro 
Summa notant pecudum, paterisque altaria libant. 

^ELneid, xii. 1. 172—174. 

And accordingly many heathen temples have been converted 

* Vid. Vitruv. lib. iv. cap. v. 



336 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



into Christian churches, without any alteration in the form of 
the building. 

The tabernacle we are now to describe, though otherwise 
called a tent, because it was a moveable fabric, and because 
it had no proper roof, but was only covered with curtains or 
canopies of cloth and skin, was nevertheless built with 
extraordinary magnificence, and at a prodigious expense, 
that it might be, in some measure, suitable to the dignity 
of the King whose palace it was to be, and to the value of 
those spiritual and eternal blessings, of which it was also 
designed as a type or emblem. The value of the gold and 
silver only, used for the w T ork of that holy place, and of which 
we have an account in the book of Exodus, chap, xxxviii. 24, 
25, amounted, according to Bishop Cumberland's reduction 
of Jewish talents and shekels to English coin, to upward of 
one hundred eighty-two thousand, five hundred, sixty-eight 
pounds. If we add to this the vast quantity of brass, or 
copper, that was also used about this fabric, its court and fur- 
niture ; the shittim-wood, of which the boards of the taber- 
nacle, as well as the pillars which surrounded the court, and 
other utensils, were made (which, though we do not know what 
name the same wood bears now, was no doubt the best and 
most costly that could be got), as also the rich embroidered 
curtains and canopies that covered the tabernacle, divided the 
parts of it, and surrounded the court ; and if we farther add 
the jewels that were set in the high-priest's ephod and breast- 
plate, which are to be considered as a part of the furniture of 
the tabernacle ; the value of the whole materials, exclusive of 
workmanship, must amount to an immense sum. This sum 
was raised, partly by voluntary contributions and presents, 
Exod. xxv. 2, &c, and partly by a poll-tax of half a shekel a 
head for every male Israelite above twenty years old, chap, 
xxx. 11 — 16; which amounted to a hundred talents and one 
thousand seven hundred seventy-five shekels ; that is, thirty- 
five thousand, three hundred, fifty-nine pounds, seven shil- 
lings and sixpence sterling; chap, xxxviii. 25. 

We may here remark, that this tax of the half shekel a 
man was, in after-times, levied yearly for the reparation of the 
temple, and for defraying the charge of public sacrifices, and 
other necessaries of divine service. This, as I have before 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TABERNACLE. 



337 



observed,* was probably the tribute demanded of our Saviour, 
Matt. xvii. 24; from which, as it was paid to God for the 
service of his house, and the support of his worship, Christ, as 
being the Son of God, might, according to the custom of all 
nations, have pleaded an exemption; ver. 25, 26. However, 
that he might give no offence, he chose to pay it, though he 
was obliged to work a miracle to raise so small a sum ; ver. 
27. 

Upon this general view of the prodigious expense of build- 
ing the tabernacle, it may naturally be inquired, whence had 
the Israelites, who had not been come a year from their slavery 
in Egypt, and from labouring at the brick-kilns, riches 
enough to defray it ? To this it may be answered,f 

1st. That though the bulk of the people had been reduced 
to the condition of slaves, yet it may be reasonably supposed 
that some, especially of the posterity of Joseph, had pre- 
served, and, it may be, concealed their wealth, till they had 
an opportunity of escaping with it out of Egypt. 

2dly. Perhaps the wilderness, where they now were, might 
supply them with some part of the materials for this building ; 
in particular the wood. Some tell us of a grove of shittim 
trees near mount Sinai, from whence they had their wood, 
with no other expense than that of labour. 

3dly. Abarbanel conjectures, that the neighbouring nations 
came and traded with the Israelites in the wilderness, and that 
God blessed their commerce to the very extraordinary increase 
of their opulence. But the Scriptures give no account of any 
strangers resorting to them at this time, besides Jethro and 
his family; probably the fate of their Egyptian enemies ter- 
rified the other neighbouring nations, and made them afraid 
to come near them. 

4thly. The spoil of the Egyptians, who were drowned in 
the Red Sea, and whose dead bodies were providentially cast 
upon the shore, where the Israelites were, might very consi- 
derably enrich them; Exod. xiv. 30. 

5thly. But we are chiefly to account for their riches by 
their having brought out of Egypt a very large quantity of 
gold and silver jewels, or vessels, as the word *>?*2 cheti sig- 

* See p. 57. 

f Vid. Witsii Miscell. torn. i. lib. ii. dissert, i. sect. x. 
z 



338 



.JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



nines, which were lent, or rather given them, by the Egyptians 
at their departure. For, by the command of God, chap. iii. 21, 
they " borrowed," or required, " of the Egyptians jewels," or 
vessels " of silver, and vessels of gold, and raiment. And the 
Lord gave them favour in the sight of the Egyptians, so that 
they lent," or gave, "them such things as they required;" 
Exod. xii. 35, 36. The verb bitw shaal, which in kal our 
translators have rendered " borrow," signifies more properly 
petere, to require or demand ; and in hiphil, where they have 
rendered it " to lend," it denotes mutuum dare, to give.* This 
sense of the verb, in both the conjugations, is warranted by the 
following passage: "The Lord,"saith Hannah, in reference to 
the birth of Samuel, " hath given me my petition which I 
asked of him, srbiW shaalti ; therefore also I have lent, liW&MtPTl 
hishiltihu, given, him to the Lord : as long as he liveth lie 
shall be lent, blXW shaul, given, to the Lord ;" 1 Sam. i. 27, 28. 
Now some of those vessels which were given to the Israel- 
ites, might probably be the silver bowls and chargers, and 
golden spoons, which were offered by the princes for the ser- 
vice of the tabernacle ; Numb. vii. By this means the divine 
prediction and promise to Abraham was signally accomplished : 
" The nation whom thy seed shall serve, and who shall afflict 
them four hundred years, will I judge, and afterwards they 
shall come out with great substance ;" Gen. xv. 13, 14. 

Having cleared the ground, and provided the proper funds 
for building the tabernacle, we come now to erect the edifice, 
or rather to take a view of it as it was erected by Moses, 
according to the visionaiy model shown him in the mount ; 
Exod. xxv. 40. 

The tabernacle was an oblong, rectangular figure, thirty 
cubits long, ten broad, and ten in height ; which, reduced to 
English measure, according to Dr. Cumberland, who supposes 
it the Egyptian cubit, nearly equal to twenty-two inches,f was 
fifty-five feet long, eighteen broad, and eighteen 4iigh. The 
two sides and one end were composed of broad boards, stand- 
ing upright; each board being about two feet nine inches 
broad, fastened at the bottom by two tenons in each board, 
fitted into two mortices in the foundation; at the top by links 

* Vid. Stockii Clav. in verbum. 

f Essay on Jewish Measures, chap. ii. p. 56. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TABERNACLE. 



339 



or hasps, and on the sides by five wooden bars, which run 
through rings or staples in each of the boards. The thickness 
of these boards is not determined in Scripture. Dr. Lightfoot 
makes it to be very great;* he supposes about nine inches, 
because the middle bar is said to shoot through the boards 
from one end to the other," Exod. xxxvi. 33; that is, as he 
conjectures, through a hole in the body of the boards. And 
no doubt they must be of a very considerable thickness, if 
they were pierced with a hole big enough to receive a wooden 
bar, which, considering its length of fifty-five feet, could not 
be slender. But as boards or timbers of such a length and 
breadth, and of such a supposed thickness, would be almost 
unmanageably heavy, may we not rather conceive, that the 
middle bar, shooting through the boards from end to end, de- 
notes only that it reached the whole length of the tabernacle, 
whereas the other bars reached but about or little more than 
half way? For though it is said, ff the middle bar in the 
midst of the boards shall reach from end to end," chap. xxvi. 
28, there was no occasion they should all do so. 

Each side consisted of twenty of these boards, and the end 
of eight; which comes to about three feet more than the 
breadth of the tabernacle. Therefore, if these eight boards 
stood together in a right line, the end must project consider- 
ably on each side of the building. But perhaps the two end 
boards of the eight stood in an angular position to the sides 
and the end of the building; for which reason they are distin- 
guished from the other six, and called " the two boards of the 
corners of the tabernacle;" ver. 23. These boards and these 
bars were all overlaid with gold; and their rings for >the 
staves, and their hasps at top, were all of the same metal. 

The foundation on which they stood was also very costly 
and magnificent. It consisted of solid blocks of silver, two 
under each board. They were each about sixteen inches long, 
and of a suitable breadth and thickness; each weighing a 
talent, or about an hundred weight. Of these there, were 
about one hundred in number, ninety-six of which were laid 
for the foundation of the walls of the tabernacle, under the 
forty-eight boards ; and the other four were the bases of the 
columns that supported the veil or curtain, which divided the 
* See his Handful of Gleanings upon Exodus, sect, xxxiv. 
z 2 



340 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



inside of the tabernacle into two rooms; Exod. xxxviii. 27. 
From hence some have derived the ancient fashion of setting 
porphyry columns on bases of white marble. 

The tabernacle, thus fitted and reared, had four different 
coverings, or curtains, or carpets, thrown one over the other, 
which hung down on the side, near to the silver foundation. 

The first and lowest carpet w T as made of fine linen, richly 
embroidered with figures of cherubim, in shades of blue, 
purple, and scarlet. It is reasonable to suppose, that the 
right side of this carpet was undermost, and so it formed a 
beautiful ceiling in the inside of the tabernacle. This carpet 
consisted of ten breadths, which were joined together with 
blue loops and clasps of gold. 

The next carpet, which lay over the embroidered one, was 
made of a sort of mohair; the breadths of these were joined 
together with clasps of brass. 

. The third carpet was made of rams' skins dyed red ; and 
the uppermost of all, which was to fence the rest from the 
weather, was made of tachash skins. What beast this was is 
not certain : it appears that shoe-leather was made of its skin ; 
for God saith concerning Jerusalem, " I clothed thee with 
broidered work, and shod thee with badger's ( tachash) skin;" 
Ezek xvi. 10. It is conceived the Latin word tax us, and 
the German tachs, may come from the Hebrew trnn tachash ; 
therefore we translate it badger. However, the Jews hold 
this to be a clean beast, which the badger is not. 

Thus we have seen the outside of the tabernacle complete 
on the top, the two sides, and one end, namely, that which 
was set toward the west, when the tabernacle was reared; 
Exod. xxvi. 22. As for the east end, it had no boards, but 
was sheltered with a fine embroidered curtain, hung upon five 
pillars of shittim-wood overlaid with gold; ver.36, 37. The 
text does not tell us how low this curtain hung. Philo makes 
it to touch the ground;*' but Josephus will have it to come 
only half way down, that so the people might have a view of 
the inside of the tabernacle, and of what was done there ; but 
then he says there was another curtain over that, which came 
down to the ground, and was to preserve it from the weather, 

* Philo, Jud. de Vita Mosis, lib. iii. p. 516, D, E, edit. Colon. Allobr. 
1613. 



CHAP. 1.] 



INSIDE OF THE TABERNACLE. 



341 



that was drawn aside on the sabbath and other festivals.* 
Philo's opinion is the more likely, since we find, by the story 
of Zachariah's ministry, Luke i., in the temple (which was 
built after the model of the tabernacle), that the people who 
were without could not see into the sanctuary. 

The inside of the tabernacle was divided into two rooms, 
by means of a veil or curtain, hung upon four pillars mentioned 
before. This veil was made of the richest stuff, both for mat- 
ter and workmanship, and adorned with cherubim and other 
ornaments, curiously embroidered upon it. It does not ap- 
pear in the Scripture account, at what distance from either 
end of the tabernacle this veil was hung ; but it is reasonably 
conjectured, that it divided the tabernacle, in the same pro- 
portion in which the temple, afterward built according to its 
model, was divided ; that is, two-thirds of the whole length 
were allotted to the first room, and one-third to the second ; 
so that the room being beyond the veil, which was called the 
holy of holies, was exactly square, being ten cubits each way ; 
and the first room, called the sanctuary, was twice as long as 
broad. 

Round the tabernacle there was a spacious area, or court, 
of one hundred cubits long and fifty broad, surrounded with 
pillars, set in bases of brass and filletted with silver, at the 
distance of five cubits from one another. So that there were 
twenty pillars on each side, and ten at each end of the court. 
These pillars had silver hooks, on which the hangings were 
fastened, that formed the inclosure of the court. These hang- 
ings were of fine twined linen; Exod. xxvii. 9. The word 
Otybp kelangnim, which we render hangings, is supposed to 
mean open or net work, from ]/Vp kalang, sculpsit. Accord- 
ingly the Targum translates it grate-w r ork. So that this in- 
closure did not wholly conceal the view of the tabernacle, and 
of the worship performed in the court, from the people that 
were without. 

The entrance into this court was at the east end, facing the 
tabernacle ; where richer hangings, for the space of twenty 
cubits, were supported by four of the pillars ; and these were 
not fastened like the rest of the hangings, but made either to 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vi. sect. iv. p. 134, edit. Haverc, 



342 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK II 



draw or lift up ; the text does not say which, but the Jews 
believe the latter. 

It is made a question, whether there was only one court, or 
more, surrounding the tabernacle. Moses mentions but one ; 
yet David speaks of " the courts of the Lord" in the plural 
number, Psalm Ixxxiv, 2. 10 ; lxv. 4, et alibi; which hath 
led some people to imagine, there were at least two ; one for 
the Levites, and the other for the people. But this cannot be 
inferred with any certainty from the word being in the plural 
number, which is so often used in the Hebrew with a singular 
signification, to denote the excellency of the thing spoken of. 
Or otherwise, Moses's account of but one court may be re- 
conciled with David's mentioning more than one, by an easy 
supposition, that after the settlement in Canaan, when the 
tabernacle was no longer to be moved about as formerly, they 
inclosed it and its court with a strong fence, at some distance 
without the pillars and hangings ; which formed an outward 
court, besides that in which the tabernacle stood. 

Though the court surrounded the tabernacle, there is no 
reason to suppose that the tabernacle stood in the centre of 
it ; for there was no occasion for so large an area at the west 
end as at the east, where the altar of burnt-offering stood , 
and several other utensils of the sacred service. It is more 
probable, that the area at this end was at least fifty cubits 
square ; and indeed a less space than that could hardly suffice 
for the work that was to be done there, and for the persons who 
were immediately to attend the service. 

Having described the tabernacle and the court that sur- 
rounded it, we proceed now to take a view of the furniture that 
belonged to both. 

The chief things in the court were the altar of burnt-offer- 
ing and the brazen laver. The altar of burnt-offering, which 
is described in the beginning of the twenty-eighth chapter of 
Exodus, was placed toward the east end of the court, fronting 
the entrance of the tabernacle ; and we must suppose, at such 
a convenient distance from it, that the smoke of the fire, which 
was constantly burning on the altar, might not sully that beau- 
tiful tent, its veil and curtains. 

The dimensions of the altar were five cubits, or about nine- 
teen feet square, and three cubits, or about five feet and a 



CHAP. I.] 



ALTAR OF BURNT- OFFERING. 



343 



half high. It was made of shittim-wood, plated over with 
brass, and it had four brass rings, through which two bars 
were put, by which it was carried upon the priests' shoulders. 
It is described with horns at the four corners, but what was 
the shape and use of these horns is not now known ; perhaps 
they were for tying the victims, according to the allusion of 
the Psalmist, " Bind the sacrifice with cords, even to the 
horns of the altar;" Psalm cxviii. 27. 

The fire was kept upon a square grate, suspended by rings 
at the corners, and, it may be, by chains in the cavity of the 
altar. The Scripture account does not determine the dimen- 
sions of this grate ; but if we suppose it to be five feet square, 
which probably was large enough for the use it was designed 
for, and if we allow six inches for the thickness of the sides 
of the altar, there would be a space of one foot and a half 
between the grate and the altar on every side ; which was suf- 
ficient to preserve the wooden sides (especially as they were 
plated over with brass) from being damaged by the fire on 
the grate. 

This grate is said to be put under the compass of the altar, 
as we understand the word carcobk, in the only two 

places where it occurs, Exod. xxvii. 5, and xxxviii. 4. The 
meaning of it, therefore, can hardly be conjectured, for want 
of parallel places by which to fix it. Mr. Saurin supposes the 
11D"D carcobh might be a copper vessel, hung by rings or chains 
to the altar over the fire on the grate, in which the flesh of the 
victims was consumed.* 

But it is a material objection against this conjecture, that 
there are some passages, in which it is enjoined, that the vic- 
tims with the head and the fat should be laid upon the wood, 
that is, upon the fire which is on the altar ; Lev. i. 8. 

Others, therefore, conceive the 3D*D carcobh to be nothing 
but a kind of cincture to the grate. Others, again, have 
imagined it to be a sort of dome over the fire, contrived to 
collect the flame, and concentre the heat, so as to consume 
the vapour that would arise from the flesh in burning, and 
thereby prevent that offensive smell which the burning such 
quantities of flesh and fat must otherwise have caused. To 
strengthen this conjecture, the authors of the Universal His- 

* See Saurin's Discours sur la Pentateuch, disc, liv., or Chamberlayne's 
translation, p. 458. 



344 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



tory tell us, they have seen in France a kind of portable 
hearth, not unlike a chaffing-dish, so artfully contrived, that 
the fire within (though not very fierce to outward appearance) 
consumed feathers, brimstone, and other like fetid materials, 
without causing the least smell.* Now if such a thing is 
possible, it is not at all unlikely there might be some such 
contrivance in the altar, to prevent any offence from the smell 
of the sacrifices. 

The fire on this altar was looked upon as sacred, having 
first descended upon it from heaven ; Lev. ix. 24. It was 
therefore to be kept constantly burning, and never to go out; 
chap. vi. 13. From hence, probably, the Chaldeans and Per- 
sians borrowed their notion of their sacred fire, which they 
preserved and nourished with religious care and attention ; a 
custom which afterward passed from them to the Greeks and 
Romans. 

The rabbies have recourse to a miracle, to account for 
the preserving of the sacred fire in their marches in the wil- 
derness, when the altar was covered with a purple cloth and a 
covering of badger's skins ; Numb. iv. 13, 14. But it may be 
as well accounted for, by supposing that the grate with the 
fire was on these occasions taken out of the altar, and carried 
by itself. 

The other considerable utensil in the court of the tabernacle 
was the brazen laver, described in the thirtieth chapter of 
Exodus, ver. 18 — 21. The place of this laver was between 
the altar and the east end of the tabernacle. Neither the 
shape nor size of it is mentioned by Moses ; probably it was 
considerably capacious, since it was for the use of all the 
priests to wash their hands and feet before they performed 
their ministry. 

It is said, that Moses " made the laver of brass, and the 
foot of it of brass, of the looking-glasses of the women who 
assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation 
Exod. xxxviii. 8. Such were the ancient mirrors, made of 
polished brass, or other metal ;f which gave but a dark or 
obscure image, in comparison of glass mirrors. Hence we 

* TJnivers. History, vol. i. part ii. p. 662, folio edit. 

t Vid. Ezek. Spanheim, Observ. in Callimach. Hymnum in Pallad. v. 21, 
p. 548 — 550, edit. Ultraject. 1697, octavo. The Targura of Jonathan ren- 
ders the text last quoted, ex sereis speeulis. 



C MAP. I .] 



THE LAYER. 



345 



read of " seeing through a glass darkly," 1 Cor. xiii. 12, or 
rather " in or by a glass," as di ecroTrrpov signifies. 

As for the custom of the women's assembling at the door of 
the tabernacle of the congregation, that is, the tabernacle of 
Moses (for it was before the tabernacle of the Lord was 
reared), some derive it from a custom of the Egyptian women, 
who (if we may credit Cyril of Alexandria) used to go to the 
temple with looking-glasses in one hand, and a timbrel in the 
other. # 

The rabbies have represented it as very meritorious in 
these Jewish women devoutly to sacrifice the most precious 
ornament of their toilets to holy uses.f Others have suspected 
a graphical error in the word DN"iD2 bemaroth, " of the look- 
ing-glasses," namely, that the prefix 2 beth may have slipped 
into the text, instead of D caph, by reason of the similitude of 
those letters ; and to strengthen this conj ecture they observe, 
that 2 beth is very seldom used to express the metal or stuff 
of which any thing is made; though sometimes, it must be 
owned, it is; J as, on mentioning the brass which David col- 
lected, it is added, wherewith, rp bah, " Solomon made the 
brazen sea," 8cc. ; 1 Chron. xviii. 8. And it is said of Asa, that 
" he carried away the stones and timber of Ramah, where- 
with Baasha was building, and therewith, Dnn baham, built 
Geba and Mizpah ;" 2 Chron. xvi. 6. They suppose, however, 
the true reading of this place was D«")DD chemaroth ; and if so, 
the proper rendering would be, " Moses made the laver of 
brass as or like the looking-glasses of the women," that is, 
he finely polished it. 

Having thus taken a view of the two most considerable 
things in the court, let us now enter into the tabernacle ; 
where in the sanctuary, or first room, we see the altar of in- 
cense, the golden candlestick, and the table of shew-bread. 

1st. The altar of incense^ was made of shittim-wood, and 
overlaid with gold. It was one cubit square, and two high, 
with an ornament of gold, in the nature, we may suppose, of a 

* Vid. Cyril, de Adoratione in Spiritu et Virtute, torn. i. lib. ii. p. 64. 
-f Vid. Aben-Ezra in Exod. xxxviii. 8. 

I Vid. Noldii Concordant. Particul. in partic. 1, signif. 14, ex, e Materia^ 
And Aben-Ezra vindicates this sense of 3 in the place before us. Vid. Cart- 
wright. Electa Targum. Rabbin, in loc. 

§ See the description of it in Exod. xxx. 1 — 10. 



346 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK II. 

carved moulding, round the top of it. The use of it was to 
burn incense upon every morning and evening. It was also 
to be sprinkled with the blood of the sacrifices that were 
offered for the sins of ignorance, committed either by particular 
persons, or by the people in general: Exod. xxx. 10; Lev. iv. 
3. 7. 13. 18. 

2dly. The golden candlestick, described Exod. xxv. 31, et 
seq., was the richest piece of furniture in the tabernacle. It 
was made of solid gold, to the weight of a talent; and, ex- 
clusive of the workmanship, which was very curious, it was 
worth, according to Cumberland, upward of five thousand 
seventy-six pounds. It contained seven lights, six branching 
out in three pairs, from the upright stem, and one on the top 
of it. This was a most useful, as well as most ornamental, 
piece of furniture in a room that had no windows. 

3dly. The table of shew-bread, described Exod. xxv. 23 — 
30, was made of the same sort of wood with the altar of in- 
cense, and, like that, overlaid and ornamented with gold. Its 
dimensions were two cubits long, one broad, and one and a 
half high. It is said to have a golden border, or crown, which 
may be supposed to be a kind of rim round it, something like 
that of our tea-tables. Upon this table were set two rows or 
piles of loaves, or cakes of bread, six in a row or pile, which 
were changed for new ones every sabbath. The stale bread 
belonged to the priests. 

This table was also furnished with golden dishes, spoons, 
and bowls, of the use of which we have no certain account. 
Perhaps they were used about the holy oil, which was kept 
in the tabernacle (see 1 Kings i. 39), and very probably upon 
this table. Perhaps, also, this was the place of the book of 
the law of the kingdom, which Samuel wrote, and laid up 
before the Lord; 1 Sam. x. 25. 

We now go, through the second veil, into the holy of 
holies ; where we are to view the ark of the testimony, and 
its lid or cover, called " the mercy-seat ." # 

The ark was a chest of fine proportion, two cubits and a 
half long, one and a half broad, and one and a half high. 
It was made of shittim-wood, but plated over with gold, both 
within and without, and richly ornamented with curious work- 



* Both these described in Exod. xxv. 10 — 21. 



CHAP. I.] 



CHERUBIM. 



347 



manship. Its chief use was to be a repository for the two 
tables of stone, on which were engraven the ten command- 
ments by the finger of God himself, and which he gave to 
Moses on Mount Sinai ; Exod. xxv. 16. These are called the 
tables of testimony, chap. xxxi. 18, not only as they were a 
witness and lasting monument of the covenant between God 
and the people of Israel, but as they would in effect testify 
against them, if they kept not that covenant. For this end 
also the book of the law, which Moses wrote, is ordered to be 
laid in or by the side of the ark ; that it " might be there for 
a witness against the disobedient;" Deut. xxxi. 26. From 
these tables the ark, in which they were preserved, is called 
the ark of the testimony, Exod. xxx. 6; and the lid of this 
chest, which covered these tables of the law, is called " the 
mercy-seat," as fitly representing the effect of God's mercy 
to the transgressors of his law ; or the covering (as it were) 
of their transgressions. And hence the word iXaarripiov, by 
which the Septuagint renders the mercy-seat, and which is 
used for it by the apostle, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, 
chap. ix. 5, is likewise given to Christ in the Epistle to the 
Romans, chap. iii. 25, where our translators render it pro- 
pitiation ; inasmuch as, by his death, he hath so covered the 
transgressions of his people, that they shall not be punished 
for them. 

The upper face of the mercy-seat was adorned with two 
figures of cherubim, either in chased work, as some think, or 
in statuary, as it is more commonly understood, and as seems 
most agreeable to the description of them in the book of 
Exodus, chap. xxv. 18 — 20. 

We have no sufficient light in Scripture absolutely to de- 
termine the form, the posture, or the size of these cherubim. 

As to their size, indeed, since they are described as having 
wings, and their wings are said, when stretched forth on high, 
to cover the mercy-seat, of which we know the dimensions, 
upon the reasonable supposition that their wings were in a 
just proportion to their bodies, we may form some idea of 
their bigness. 

As to their posture, their faces are said " to be toward 
one another and toward the mercy-seat;" which probably 
means that they stood in an erect posture on the mercy-seat, 



348 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



with their faces toward each other, and both of them with 
their heads somewhat inclined, as looking down upon, con- 
templating, and admiring the mysteries typified by the ark 
and mercy-seat on which they stood. This may give occasion 
to the allusion of St. Peter, when, speaking of the mysteries 
of redemption, he says, " which things the angels desire to 
look into;" 1 Pet. i. 12. 

But we are at the greatest loss of all to determine the true 
shape and form of these cherubim. Some, upon observing 
that the verb mD charabh, in the Syriac language, sometimes 
means simulavit, conceive the noun nro cherubh signifies no 
more than an image, figure, or representation of any thing. 
Aben-Ezra is of this opinion.* Josephus says, they were 
flying animals, like none of those which are seen by men, but 
such as Moses saw about the throne of God.-f* In another 
place he says, " As for the cherubim, nobody can tell or con- 
ceive what they were like. "J However, the generality of in- 
terpreters, both ancient and modern, suppose them to be of a 
human shape, only with the addition of wings. § The reason 
of which supposition is, perhaps, chiefly because Moses de- 
scribes them as having faces, though that will by no means 
prove the point, because faces are attributed to beasts as well 
as to men. It is certain, that what Ezekiel in one place re- 
presents as the face of an ox, in another he represents as the 
face of a cherub, chap. i. 10, compared with chap. x. 14, 15. 
From whence others have conceived the cherubim to be rather 
of the shape of flying oxen ; and it is alleged in favour of this 
opinion, that the far more common meaning of the verb ZLI'D 
charabh, in the Arabic, Syriac, and Chaldee, being to plough, 
the natural meaning of cherubh is a creature used in 
ploughing, which in the eastern countries was generally the 
ox. || This seems to have been the ancient opinion, which 
tradition had handed down, concerning the shape of the che- 

* See the reasons on which Aben-Ezra grounds his opinion, in Christoph. 
Cartwright. Electa Targum. Rabbin, in Exod. xxv. 18. 

■j- Antiq. lib. iii. cap. vi. sect. v. p. 135, 136, edit. Havercamp. 

X Antiq. lib. viii. cap. iii. sect. iii. p. 424, edit. Haverc. 

§ That this was the opinion of several rabbies, see in Cartwright, ubi 
supra. 

|| Bochart. Hierozoic. part. i. lib. ii. cap. xxxv. Oper. torn. ii. p. 358, 
edit. 1712. 



CHAP. I.J 



jeroboam's idolatry. 



349 



rubim with the flaming sword, that guarded the tree of life ; 
Gen. iii. 24. And Ovid's fable concerning Jason's golden 
fleece being guarded by brazen-footed bulls, which breathed 
out fire, was, perhaps, grounded upon it : 

Ecce adamanteis Vulcanum naribus efflant 

iEripides tauri. Metamorph. lib. vii. 1. 104. 

We observe farther, that as Ezekiel describes the face of a 
cherub and the face of an ox as the same, so St. John, in his 
description of the four £wa, or living creatures, which he saw 
in his vision, and which seem in all respects to answer to the 
four living creatures in EzekiePs vision, calls that the calf, 
which Ezekiel calls the ox or cherub ; Rev. iv. 7. From hence 
we may give a probable account of the strangest part of the 
story of Jeroboam's idolatry, his setting up the two golden 
calves for objects of worship in Dan and Bethel; 1 Kings xii. 
28, 29. I call it the strangest part, because it appears won- 
derful, not only that Jeroboam himself should be so stupid as 
to set up calves for gods, but that the bulk of the nation 
should so readily fall into such senseless idolatry ; but it re- 
lieves our conceptions, if we consider these calves as nothing 
but cherubim, the very same sort of figures that were placed 
in the temple by God's own appointment: so that Jeroboam 
not only set up the worship of the same God, and in the same 
modes and forms that were practised at Jerusalem, but the 
same symbols of the Divine presence to which the people had 
been accustomed. It is, therefore, no wonder they so gene- 
rally fell in with him in some little alterations, particularly as 
to the place of their most solemn public worship, especially if 
we attend to the plausible things he might allege on this head ; 
namely, that it was a usual practice of the holy patriarchs to 
build altars, and to worship God, wherever they came and 
made any stay. Abraham sacrificed in Shechem, and at 
Bethel, in the plain of Mamre, and at Beersheba. The ark 
and the tabernacle were many years at Shiloh, and there the 
people sacrificed. It was from hence moved to Kirjath- 
jearim, and after that to several other places, in all which 
sacrifices were offered to God with acceptance. At length 
David, and then Solomon his son, having chosen to fix their 
court at Jerusalem, and to have the temple near to the royal 



350 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



palace, it was built in that city. However, the whole land is 
holy; and they should not be so superstitious as to imagine 
the presence of God is limited to one place more than another, 
but wherever his pure worship is performed, he would meet 
his people and bless them. Or if it should be alleged, that 
Solomon had built the temple at Jerusalem by the express ap- 
pointment of God, might not Jeroboam reply, that Solomon 
had so defiled that city by his lewdness and his idolatries, 
that it was now become an impure place; and any other, 
therefore, might surely be as proper for the most solemn wor- 
ship, especially Bethel, the house of God, the place where he 
had anciently chose to dwell ?* Thus might Jeroboam vindi- 
cate his conduct, perhaps as well as any will-worshipper could 
ever do. Nevertheless, as he went contrary to a divine in- 
stitution, his cherubim are contemptuously called calves, and 
he is frequently branded as that great sinner who made Israel 
to sin, which should be a caution to us by no means to depart 
from, but to keep close to, divine institutions in all matters 
of religious worship.f 

To return to the cherubim. Clemens of Alexandria seems 
to have been of opinion, that the Egyptian sphynx, and other 
hieroglyphical beasts, were borrowed from these cherubim and 
those in Ezekiel's vision. J Hence it appears, that he did not 

* The greatest part of the speech which I have put into the mouth of 
Jeroboam, is taken from Josephus, who seems to have supposed, that the 
sin of this prince was not worshipping another God, but, for political rea- 
sons, worshipping the true God in a manner contrary to his institution. 
Joseph. Antiq. lib. viii. cap. viii. p. 445, edit. Havercamp. 

f Concerning the figure of the cherubim, and the sin of Jeroboam in 
erecting such in Dan and Bethel, in imitation of those at Jerusalem, see 
Moncaeus de Vitulo Aureo, cap. iv. — ix., apud Criticos Sacros, torn. ix. 
p. 4429, et seq. In cap. x. et seq., he answers the objections to his opinion. 
A short abstract of what he offers on the subject may be seen in Pool's 
Synopsis on 1 Kings xii. 29. It is remarkable, that the author, who was a 
Papist, takes occasion, from this sin of Jeroboam, to harangue the Protes- 
tants, and the king of Great Britain in particular, on the heinous guilt of 
schism. There would have been more propriety in his addressingthe Church 
of Rome, and her infallible head, the Pope, on the guilt of abrogating or 
dispensing with divine institutions. Consult, likewise, on this subject, 
Bochart. Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. xxxv. Oper. torn. ii. p. 354 — 360. 

X Strom, lib. v. apud Oper. p. 566, 567, edit. Paris, 1641. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE SHECHTN A H . 



351 



take them to be, entirely at least, of a human form and 
shape.* 

It was between these two cherubim, over the mercy-seat, 
that the Shechinah, or miraculous light, used to appear, as 
the visible token of the special presence of God:f from 
whence he is said to " dwell between the cherubim," Psalm 
lxxx. 1 ; and " to sit between the cherubim;" Psalm xcix. 1. 
In consequence of which the people are called upon to worship 
at his footstool, ver. 5, that is, the ark and the mercy-seat. 

We have before observed, that the two tables of the law, 
which God gave to Moses, were deposited in the ark under 
the mercy-seat ; and with them were laid up, it should seem 
in the same chest, the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's 
rod that budded. For the author of the Epistle to the He- 
brews/speaking of the tabernacle, mcrivy y \tyofitvy ayia ayiwv, 
which is called the holiest of all, which had the golden censer, 
and the ark, rr]v ki(3u)tov, of the covenant, adds, wherein t v y> 
was the pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, 
and the tables of the covenant; Heb. ix. 3, 4. But*how to 
reconcile this passage, if we understand it to assert, that the 

* On this head consult Dr. Watts on the figure of a cherub, in his Rem- 
nantsof Time improved, in his Works, vol; iv. ; and Witsii iEgyptiaca, lib. ii. 
cap. xiii. 

■f This Shechinah, or visible glory of Jehovah, after it had conducted 
the Israelites through the wilderness (see p. 14), had its more stated resi- 
dence in the tabernacle and the temple. For a farther account of this mi- 
raculous phenomenon, consult part ii. chap. ii. of Mr. Lowman's Rationale 
of the Hebrew Ritual. There are some remarkable things in Lord Barring- 
ton's Dissertation on God's Visible Presence, at the end of the second edit, 
of his Essay; and in p. 39 of his Essay, note xii., where he hath endeavoured 
to trace this divine appearance from the creation till a little after the flood, 
and from the giving of the law to the destruction of the first temple. To- 
land's attempt to prove that this apprehended miraculous appearance had 
nothing miraculous in it, but was only a kind of beacon made use of by the 
Israelites for their direction in their journey (see his " Hodegus, or Pillar of 
Cloud and Fire not miraculous," in his piece called Tetradymus), was an- 
swered in a pamphlet called " Hodegus Confuted, or a plain Demonstra- 
tion, that the Pillar of Cloud and Fire, that guided the Israelites in the Wil- 
derness, was not a Fire of human Preparation, but the most miraculous Pre- 
sence of God," published 1721, 8vo. And likewise in " A Discourse upon 
the Pillar of Cloud and Fire," &c. inserted in the Bibliotheca Literaria, 1723, 
Numb: v. p. 1, and following. The sentiments of the Jewish writers upon 
this subject may be seen in Buxtorf. Exercitat. de Area Foederis. 



352 



j EWIS II 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK II. 



pot of manna, and Aaron's rod, were laid up in the ark, with 
the assertion in the First Book of Kings, that there was nothing 
in the ark save the two tables of stone which Moses put there 
at Horeb, 1 Kings viii. 9, is somewhat difficult. Some say, 
the apostle speaks of the ark as it was in the time of Moses ; 
the text in Kings, as it was in Solomon's time, when upon 
some occasion or other, the pot of manna and Aaron's rod had 
been taken out of it. But this is hardly probable. There- 
fore tv 7j, in which, must either signify " near to which/' in 
which sense the particle fv is sometimes used ; # or rather, I 
apprehend, ev y, in which, refers not to Kifiurov, the ark, im- 
mediately preceding, but to the remote antecedent, gkt\v^ y 
Afyo/xcvp ayta ayiojv, the second tabernacle, or holy of holies ; 
and is parallel to the expression which just before occurs, 
(TKTjvrj yap KaTsaicavcKjSy ij irpuTtj, " there was a first tabernacle 
made, wherein, ev ?j, was the candlestick and the table," &c. 

That the tabernacle' and all its furniture were typical and 
emblematical of spiritual blessings,*-}- we are assured by the 
apostle ; Heb. ix. 9, and x. l,et alibi. But for the particular 
meaning of these several mysteries we refer to Witsius's Dis- 
sertation de Tabernaculi Mysteriis, in the first volume of his 
Miscellanea.J: 

Of the Temple. 

Having taken a survey of the tabernacle, we proceed to 
the temple at Jerusalem, which was built much after the 
model of the former edifice, but every way in a more magni- 
ficent and expensive manner. 

According to the opinion of some persons, there were three 
different temples ; the first built by David and Solomon ; the 
second by Zerubbabel, and Joshua the high-priest ; and the 
third by Herod, a little before the birth of Christ. The Jews 
acknowledge only two ;§ for they do not allow the third to be 

* See Whitby in loc. 

f Vid. Deyling. Observ. Sacr. part i. obser. xvii. p. 68. 

X On this subject consult Buxtorf 's Exercitat. de Area Foederis. And 
with respect to the tabernacle, as well as all its furniture, read Joseph. Antiq. 
lib. iii. cap. vi. 

§ Vid. Reland. Antiq. Hebr. part i. cap. vi. sect. ii. p. 58, edit. 1717, and 
the passages of the Talmud there quoted. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TEMPLE. 



353 



a new temple, but only the second rebuilt. And this best 
agrees with the prophecy of Haggai, chap. ii. 9 ; that " the 
glory of this latter house, namely, ZerubbabePs temple, should 
be greater than that of the former," which undoubtedly was 
said in reference to the Messiah's honouring it with his per- 
sonal presence and ministry. 

The first temple was built by David and Solomon. David 
provided materials for it before his death, and Solomon raised 
the edifice. It stood on Mount Zion, Psalm cxxxii. 13, 14; 
which was the general name of a range of hills in that neigh- 
bourhood. The name of that particular hill on which the 
temple stood, was Moriah ; 2 Chron. iii. 1. The Jews will 
have it to be the very spot on which Abraham went about to 
sacrifice Isaac; and where Adam paid his first devotions after 
his creation, and sacrificed after his fall. This hill had been 
purchased by David of Araunah, or Oman, king of the Je- 
busites.* 

It is remarkable, that though in the Second Book of Samuel 
we have an account that " David purchased the threshing floor 
of Oman, with the oxen, for fifty shekels of silver," chap.xxiv. 
24 ; in the First Book of Chronicles it is said, " he gave to 
Oman, for the place, six hundred shekels of gold;" chap, 
xxi. 25. To solve this difficulty, some learned men, observing 
that the words p|D3 kassaph, and nrtf zahab, which we render 
silver and gold in these two passages, are both used some- 
times for money in general, imagine that the former sum was 
fifty shekels of gold, and the latter six hundred shekels of 
silver ; and if so, both amount to much the same value, about 
five hundred and forty-seven pounds. But it seems an easier 
and more natural supposition, that the former sum was for the 
floor, oxen, and wooden instruments only, and the latter was 
afterward paid for the whole hill, whereon David chose to 
build the temple .f 

* 2 Sam. xxiv. 23, where the literal version is, "All this- did Araunah, 
the king, give unto the king." 

f Capel, in his Critica Sacra, lib. i. cap. x. sect. x. p. 37, supposes, 
that these different numbers are owing to the blunder of some transc/iber, 
and are therefore most easily reconciled by admitting a various lection 
And many of this learned man's conjectures, to his immortal honour, are 
confirmed by the Hebrew manuscripts, as Dr. Kennicott hath had occasion 
to observe ; and perhaps this may appear in various other instances, when 

2 A 



354 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



The expense of erecting this magnificent structure was pro- 
digious ; and, indeed, according to the common acceptation 
of the Scripture account, next to incredible ; the gold and 
silver only, which was provided for that purpose, amounting 
to upward of eight thousand millions sterling, 1 Chron. xxii. 
14 ; xxix. 4. 6, 7 ; which, says Dr. Prideaux, was sufficient to 
have built the w r hole temple with solid silver,* and greatly 
exceeds all the treasures of all the monarchs in Christendom. 

But it may be observed, that the number of these talents, 
by which the gold and silver is computed, is mentioned only 
in the book of Chronicles, w 7 hich was undoubtedly written 
after the return from the Babylonish captivity, as appears 
from its mentioning Cyrus's decree for the building the tem- 
ple, 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22, 23; and from its carrying the gene- 
alogy beyond Zerubbabel, who was one of the chiefs that re- 
turned from Babylon, 1 Chron. iii. 19; and it is not, there- 
fore, improbable, that at the time of writing this book the 
Jews might compute by the Babylonish talent, which was little 
more than half the Mosaic talent, or perhaps by the Syriac 
talent, which was but one-fifth of the Babylonish ; and thus 
the whole mass of gold and silver would be reduced to a com- 
paratively moderate quantity, and yet be abundantly sufficient 
to build a most magnificent temple. 

The plan, and the w T hole model of this structure, was laid by 
the same divine Architect as that of the tabernacle, namely, 
God himself ; chap, xxviii. 11,12. We may reasonably, there- 
fore, conclude, it was the completest building that was ever 
erected ; and it is no improbable conjecture of those who are 
for deriving all the Grecian orders and just ornaments in 
architecture from this temple. 

It was built, as was said before, much in the same form 
with the tabernacle, only every way of larger dimensions. It 
was surrounded, except the front, or east end, w T ith three 
stories of chambers, each five cubits square, which reached to 
half the height of the temple ; and the front was graced with 
a magnificent portico, which rose to the height of an hundred 
and twenty cubits. So that the shape of the whole was not 

that gentleman hath finished his great work of the collation, in which he is 
now engaged. 

* Prideaux's Connect, part t. book i. vol. i. p. 7, 8, note q. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TEMPLE. 



355 



unlike some churches we have seen, which have a lofty tower 
in the front, and a lower aisle running along each side of the 
building. 

The utensils for sacred service were the same as in the ta- 
bernacle ; only several of them, as the altar, candlestick, Sec, 
were larger in proportion to the more spacious edifice to which 
they belonged. This first temple was at length plundered by 
Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, of all its rich furniture, and 
the building itself destroyed, after it had stood, according to 
Josephus, four hundred and seventy years, six months, and 
ten days, from its dedication.* Though other chronologers, 
as particularly Calvisius and Scaliger, reduce the number of 
years to four hundred and twenty-seven or eight ; and Usher, 
to four hundred and twenty -four, three months, and eight 
days.i" 

The second temple was built by the Jews upon their return 
from the Babylonish captivity, under the influence and direc- 
tion of Zerubbabel their governor, and of Joshua the high- 
priest, with the leave and by the encouragement of Cyrus, the 
Persian emperor, to whom Judea was now become a tributary 
kingdom. This is that Cyrus, of whom Isaiah had prophesied 
by name two hundred years before he was born, and had pre- 
dicted his encouraging the rebuilding Jerusalem and the tem- 
ple ; chap. xliv. 28; xlv. 1. It is probable that Daniel had 
showed Cyrus this prophecy, and that Cyrus refers to it in his 
proclamation for rebuilding the temple : " The Lord God," 
saith he, " hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and 
charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem ;" Ezra i. 2. 
He also restored the sacred utensils which Nebuchadnezzar 
had put in the temples of his god ; and not only gave leave to 
the Jews to rebuild their temple, but encouraged his own 
people to assist them with presents for carrying on the work ; 
chap. i. 4. Upon which the foundation of a new building was 
laid, with great rejoicing of the people; only some old men, 
who remembered the glory of Solomon's temple, and had no 
expectation that this, which was erecting by a few poor exiles, 
just returned to their own country, could ever equal that in 

* Antiq. lib. x. cap. viii. sect. v. p. 528, edit Haverc. 
f Usser. Annal. A.M. 3416, p. 71, and Scaliger de Emend. Temp. p. 400, 
edit. Colon. Allobr. 1629. 

2 a 2 







356 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK II. 

magnificence, wept with a loud voice, while others were 
shouting with joy; chap. hi. 12, 13. However, the work, 
which was thus cheerfully begun, went on but slowly, partly 
for want of zeal for God's honour and worship, for which they 
were reproved by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, and 
partly, also, through the envy and malice of their neighbours, 
the Samaritans, who, by their ill offices at court, prevailed with 
the emperor to put a stop to the work ; chap. iv. 23, 24. At 
length, after an intermission of about thirteen years, it was 
vigorously reassumed under the encouragement of the em- 
peror Darius, and completely finished in the sixth year of his 
reign; chap. vi. 15. Upon which the new temple was dedi- 
cated with great solemnity and much rejoicing; ver. 16, 17. 

That there was really a very considerable difference and dis- 
parity between the old and this new temple is very certain, 
not only from the old men's lamentation before mentioned, but 
from the following passage of the prophet Haggai : " Who is 
left amongst you, that saw this house in its first glory ? And 
how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes, in comparison 
of it, as nothing ?" chap. ii. 3. And also from the promise 
which God gave them, in order to comfort them on this occa- 
sion, that he would raise the glory of this latter temple above 
that of the former, by the presence of the Messiah in it ; 
ver. 9. 

The Jews tell us, the second temple wanted five remarkable 
things, which were the chief glory of the first temple: the ark 
and mercy-seat : — the divine presence, or visible glory in the 
holy of holies, which they call the Shechinah : — the holy fire 
on the altar, which had been first kindled from heaven : — the 
Urim and Thummim : — and the spirit of prophecy. 

This temple was plundered and wretchedly profaned by 
Antiochus Epiphanes, who not only rifled it of all its riches, 
but caused it to be polluted by sacrificing swine's flesh upon 
the altar. He also caused the public worship in it to cease.* 

It was afterward purified, and the divine worship restored 
by Judas Maccabseus, on which occasion the temple, or at 
least the altar, was dedicated anew, and an annual festival 
was instituted in commemoration of this happy event. This is 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. xii. cap. v. sect. iv. p. 609, edit. Haverc. ; and 
1 Maccab. i. 20 — 24, and 45 — 47. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TEMPLE. 



357 



the feast of dedication which we read of in the Gospel of 
St. John, chap. x. 22, and which is said to be in winter, 
and could not, therefore, be kept in remembrance of the dedi- 
cation of the temple of Solomon ; for that was in the seventh 
month, which is just after harvest, 1 Kings viii. 2; nor of 
Zerubbabel's temple, which was dedicate^ in the month Adar, 
in the spring. It must, therefore, be the festival which was 
instituted by Judas Maccabaaus, on his having purified the 
temple and altar from the pollution of Antiochus. This feast 
was celebrated for eight days successively, from the twenty- 
fifth day of the month Casleu, answering to our December; 
1 Maccab. iv. 59. And it is also mentioned by Josephus as 
a festival to which great regard was paid in his time.* This 
festival is still observed by the Jews ; yet not as a time of re- 
joicing, but of mourning, on account of the destruction of their 
temple, and the calamities which have befallen their nation. 

When this second temple was grown old, and out of repair, 
having stood five hundred years, king Herod, in order to in- 
gratiate himself with the Jews, and to perpetuate his own 
memory, offered to rebuild it : which brings us, 

Thirdly. To Herod's temple, which was a far more mag- 
nificent structure than Zerubbabel's, and came much nearer 
to the glory of Solomon's. Tacitus, the Roman historian, 
calls it " Immensae opulentiae templum," a temple of immense 
opulence .f Josephus says, it was the most astonishing struc- 
ture he had ever seen or heard of, as well on account of its 
architecture as its magnitude, and likewise the richness and 
magnificence of its various parts, and the fame and reputa- 
tion of its sacred appurtenances. J As for Rabbi Jehuda, the 
compiler of the Talmud, and other more modern writers, who 
have given us descriptions of this temple, which none of them 
had ever seen, we can have little dependence on their ac- 
counts, especially as they differ so much from one another, 
each having, in a manner, erected a separate edifice ; to which 
one cannot help suspecting, that the strength of imagination 
has sometimes contributed more largely than the knowledge of 

* Antiq. lib. xii. cap. vii. sect. vii. p. 617, edit. Haverc. 
f Tacit. Histor. lib. v. sect. viii. p. 202, edit. Glasg. 1743. 
t Joseph, de Bell. Judaic, lib. vi. cap. iv. sect. viii. p. 386, edit. Ha- 
verc. 



358 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



history. But Josephus was himself a priest ih the temple he 
describes, and wrote soon after its destruction, when, if he 
had given a false, or remarkably inaccurate account, he might 
have been contradicted by numbers who had viewed it as well 
as himself. For that reason, he is to be credited beyond any 
of the rest, # though one cannot avoid suspecting, that even 
in his description there is some panegyric exceeding the 
bounds of truth, intermixed with faithful and exact narrative ; 
for instance, when he tells us of some stones in the building 
forty-five cubits long, five high, and six broad. That there 
were, indeed, some extraordinary large stones, may be col- 
lected from the following passage of the evangelist Mark : 
" And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples saith 
unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and w 7 hat build- 
ings are here!" chap. xiii. 1. And in Luke they are styled 
"goodly stones;" chap. xxi. 5. But I apprehend it would 
puzzle all the mathematicians of the present age to contrive 
machines by which stones of such prodigious weight and size, 
as those mentioned by Josephus, could be raised and managed. 
We are to consider he wrote before the invention of printing, 
when books could not be soon and easily published and dis- 
persed into many hands, as they now are. It is possible, 
therefore, a vain desire of exalting the glory of his nation, 
might prevail with him, in some cases, above a strict regard 
to truth, when it was probable, none, who were able to con- 
tradict him, might ever see his book; or if they should, and 
were of his own nation, they would not be inclined to do it.^f" 
Hitherto we have only considered the temple itself, which 
consisted of the portico, the sanctuary, and the holy of holies, 
But this was only a small part of the sacred building on the 
top of Mount Moriah ; for the temple was surrounded with 
spacious courts, making a square of half a mile in circum- 
ference. 

* See his Description of the Temple, de Bell. Judaic, lib. v. cap. v^ 
p. 331, et seq. 

f There is, however, a surprising account in Mr. Maundrel's Travels, 
p. 138, edit. 1749, Oxon, of the size of some stones, which, he saith, he 
saw himself in a wall which encompassed the temple of Balbec ; one stone 
was twenty-one, and two others each twenty yards long, four yards deep ? 
and as many broad. And the authors of the Universal History quote De La 
Hoque, a French author, as giving the same account. 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TEMPLE. 



359 



The first court, which encompassed the temple and the 
other courts, was called the court of the Gentiles ; because 
Gentiles were allowed to come into it, but no farther. It was 
enclosed with a wall, twenty cubits high, on the top of which 
were chambers, or galleries, supported by the wall on the 
outer side, and by rows of columns on the inside ; as the 
sides of the Royal Exchange, or the Piazzas in Covent 
Garden are. These piazzas of the temple are called aroai by 
Josephus, and in the New Testament ; which we translate 
porches, though not very properly, for the English word 
porch conveys a very different idea from the Greek word 
aToa, which is better rendered piazza. That on the east side 
was called Solomon's piazza (see John x. 23; Acts iii. 11), 
because it stood upon a vast terrace, which he built up from 
the valley beneath, four hundred cubits high, in order to en- 
large the area on the top of the mountain, and make it equal 
to the plan of his intended building. As this terrace was the 
only work of Solomon's remaining in Herod's temple, the 
piazza, that stood upon it, still retained the name of the former 
prince. 

Of the same kind with these piazzas were doubtless the five 
Groat, which surrounded the pool of Bethesda ; John v. 2. 
The pool was probably a pentagon, and the piazzas round it 
were designed to shelter from the weather the multitude of 
diseased persons who lay waiting for a cure by the miraculous 
virtue of those waters. 

Within this outward great court was a less court, of an 
oblong y rectangular figure, near to the west end of which the 
temple stood. Into this court none but Israelites might enter. 
It was also surrounded with a wall, and adorned with piazzas, 
in the manner of the great court. The rabbies speak of two 
walls, and a space between them of ten cubits broad, which 
they call the V>n chel, that parted the court of the Israelites 
from the court of the Gentiles. This is what they understand 
by the word in the Lamentations of Jeremiah, chap. ii. 8; 
" He made the chel and the wall to lament ; they languished 
together." # But however that be, the wall that divided be- 

* Vid. Maimon. de iEdificio Templi, cap. vii. sect. iii. p. 39, Creriii 
Fasciculi Sexti. There is, however, a mistake in the translation ; instead of 



360 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 11. 



tween the court of the Gentiles and the court of the Israelites 
is evidently alluded to in the following passage of St. Paul : 
" But now in Christ Jesus, ye, who sometime were afar off, 
are made nigh by the blood of Christ : for he is our peace, 
who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle 
wall of partition between us," Eph. ii. 13, 14 : which ex- 
presses the union of the Jews and Gentiles in one church by 
Jesus Christ. 

In the outer court was probably kept the market of beasts 
for sacrifice, which is mentioned by St. John, chap. ii. 14; 
and there likewise were the money-changers, which he also 
speaks of, who for a small gratuity furnished people, in ex- 
change for other coin, with half shekels, for payment of the 
annual tribute which every Israelite was to give into the sa- 
cred treasury. 

The court of the Israelites was divided into two parts. 
The first, entering at the east end, w r as called the court of the 
women, because they were allowed to come no nearer the 
temple than that court. Of this, indeed, we have no account 
in Scripture, except it be the same that was called, in Jeho- 
shaphat's time, the new court; 2 Chron. xx. 5. There seem 
to have been but two courts originally belonging to Solomon's 
temple ; one called " the court of the priests ;" the other, 
" the great court," chap. iv. 9 ; and we read that " Manasseh 
built altars for all the hosts of heaven, in the two courts of 
the house of the Lord ;" chap, xxxiii. 5. In the great, or 
outward court, devout Gentiles were allowed to pay their de- 
votion to the God of Israel ; and in the court of the priests, 
or the inner court, the priests and other Israelites worshipped. 
And as in those times there seems to have been no other dis- 
tinction of courts but these tw r o, the setting the women at a 
greater distance from the temple, and from the special tokens 
of God's presence, than the men, must have been the con- 
trivance of some later ages, without any divine institution, 
that we find, to support it. 

In this court of the women there was placed one chest, or 

being altidudine, in height ten cubits, it should be latitudine, in breadth. 
Vid. Mishn. tit. Middoth. cap. ii. sect. iii. L'Empereur, not. 3, in loc, 
torn. v. p. 326, Surenhus. * 



CHAP. I.] 



THE TEMPLE. 



361 



more, the Jews say eleven, for receiving the voluntary con- 
tributions of the people toward defraying the charges of pub- 
lic worship : such as providing the public sacrifices, wood for 
the altar, salt, and other necessaries. That part of the area 
where these chests were placed, was the yaZo(j)v\aKtov, or 
treasury, mentioned by St. Mark, chap. xii. 41. And per- 
haps the whole court, or at least the piazza on one side and 
the chambers over it, in which the sacred stores were kept, 
was from hence called by the same name ; as the following 
passage of St. John seems to imply : " These words spake 
Jesus in the treasury, as he taught in the temple;" John viii. 
20. 

From the court of the women, which was on higher ground 
than the court of the Gentiles, they ascended by fifteen steps 
into the inner court, in which the temple and altar stood. 
Into this court, not only the priests, but all male Israelites 
might enter. Nevertheless, in this court there was a distinc- 
tion made in Herod's temple, of which we read nothing in 
Solomon's, between the court of the priests and that of the 
people. The court of the priests was nothing but an inclo- 
sure of a rail or wall of one cubit high, round about the altar, 
at a convenient distance from it, to which the people were to 
bring their offerings and sacrifices; but none beside the 
priests were allowed to come within that enclosure. 

From hence probably the Papists have taken the hint of 
railing in their altars. 

Herod began to build the temple about sixteen years be- 
fore the birth of Christ, and so far completed it in nine years 
and a half, that it was fit for divine service. In all which 
time, the Jews say, it never rained in the day time, but only 
in the night, that the sacred building might not be retarded. 
However, the outbuildings of the courts were not finished 
till several years after our Saviour's death ; so that when he 
was about thirty years old, the temple had been forty-six in 
building : which is the meaning of this passage in the evan- 
gelist John: '' Forty and six years was," wKoSojuji^ij, which 
should rather be rendered, hath been, " this temple in build- 
ing;" chap. ii. 20. 

The external glory of this latter temple consisted not only 



362 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



in the opulence and magnificence of the building, but in the 
rich gifts, avaSri/jLciTa, with which it was adorned, and which 
excited the admiration of those who beheld them; Luke 
xxi. 5. The hanging up of ava^/iaTa, or consecrated gifts, was 
common in most of the ancient temples; as we find it parti- 
cularly was in the temple at Jerusalem ; where, among the 
rest, was a golden table given by Pompey, and several golden 
vines of exquisite workmanship, and of an immense size, with 
clusters, saith Josephus, avSpo/mriKeiQ, as tall as a man.* 

This magnificent temple was at length, through the righte- 
ous judgment of God on that wicked and abandoned nation, 
who had literally turned it into a den of thieves, utterly 
destroyed by the Romans, on the same month, and on the 
same day of the month, on which Solomon's temple was 
destroyed by the Babylonians .f 

* Joseph, de Bell. Judaic, lib. v. cap. v. sect. iv. p. 333, edit. Haverc. 

f On this subject may be consulted Lightfoot's Description of the Tem- 
ple, and Capel's Templi Hierosolymitani triplex delineatio ex Villalpando, 
Josepho, Maimonide et Talmude, prefixed to Walton's Polyglot. 



CHAPTER II. 



THE SYNAGOGUES, SCHOOLS, AND HOUSES OF 
PRAYER. 

The term synagogue, primarily signifying an assembly, 
came, like the word church, to be applied to places in which 
any assemblies, especially those for the worship of God, met, 
or were convened. The Jews use it in the primary sense, when 
they speak of the great synagogue ; meaning the court of se- 
venty elders, which they pretend to have been instituted ori- 
ginally by Moses, and the members of which they afterward 
increased to one hundred and twenty. 

We are now to treat of synagogues, chiefly in the latter 
sense; namely, as denoting places of worship. And thus 
they were a kind of chapels of ease to the temple, and ori- 
ginally intended for the convenience of such as lived too re- 
mote statedly to attend the public worship there. But in the 
latter ages of the Jewish state, synagogues were multiplied 
far beyond what such convenience required. If we may be- 
lieve the rabbies, there were no less than four hundred and 
eighty, or, according to others, four hundred and sixty, # of 
them in Jerusalem, where the temple stood. So great a 
number indeed exceeds all reasonable belief. Nevertheless, 
it is easy to imagine, that as the erecting synagogues came to 
be considered as a very meritorious work of piety (see Luke 
vii. 4, 5), the number might soon be increased, by the super- 
stition of religious zealots, beyond all necessity or con- 
venience. 

The almost profound silence of the Old Testament con- 
cerning synagogues hath induced several learned men to con- 

* Gemar. Hierosol. tit. Megill. cap. iii. fol. 73, col. 4, and tit. Cethuboth, 
cap. xiii. fol. 35, col. 3. Vid. Selden. Prolegom. in librum de Successioni- 
bus in Bona Defunctorum, p. 15, 16, apud Opera, vol. ii. torn. i. Or Light- 
foot, Centur. Chorograph. Matt. xxvi. 



364 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



elude, that they had a very late original. Mr. Basnage sup- 
poses them to be coeval with the traditions in the time of the 
Asmonean princes, but a few ages before Christ. Dr. Pri- 
deaux does not admit there were any synagogues before the 
Babylonish captivity. # Vitringa is of the same opinion, and 
hath said a great deal in support of it.f In favour of which 
sentiment Reland also quotes some passages from the rab- 
bies.J But I cannot think their arguments are conclusive. 
For, in the seventy-fourth Psalm, which seems to have been 
written on occasion of the Babylonish captivity, there is men- 
tion made of their enemies having burnt or destroyed ' ( all the 
synagogues of God in the land," ^N-^j/ift-VD col-mongna- 
dlit-tl baarets, Psalm lxxiv. 8 : in which passage not only 
*>l$)ft mongnadhe, from iy*> jangnadh, convenire fecit ad locum 
tempusque statutum, seems to be properly translated syna- 
gogues, where the people were statedly to meet for divine 
worship ; but the words b"D col and iniO baarets, all the syna- 
gogues of God in the land, being added, prevent our under- 
standing this expression, as some do, only of the temple, and 
the holy places belonging to it at Jerusalem. Vitringa seems 
sensible of the force of this argument, and endeavours, there- 
fore, to show, that the phrase may either mean all the places 
throughout the land, where God had occasionally met his 
people in old time, and which, on that account, were had in 
peculiar veneration ; or, at least, the schools and academies 
of the prophets. An interpretation which seems not very 
natural ; and indeed this learned author himself was so doubt- 
ful of it, that he adds, discerning persons will not imagine, 
that this one passage, which is of an uncertain sense, is suf- 
ficient to counterbalance the arguments I have produced, to 
prove that synagogues were of a later original. 

Again, I observe, that St. James speaks of Moses being 
read in the synagogues "of old time;" Acts xv. 21. And 
indeed it can hardly be imagined, that the bulk of a nation, 
which was the only visible church of God in the world, should, 
in their purest times, in the days of Joshua, Samuel, and 
David, seldom or never pay him any public worship : and 

* Connect, vol. ii. p. 534 — 536. 

f Vitring. de Synag. Vet. lib. i. part ii. cap. ix. — xii. 

X Reland. Antiq. Sacr. parti, cap. x. seel. iii. p. 128, 129, 3d edit. 1717. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES, 



365 



this must have been the case, if they had no other places for 
it besides the tabernacle; and on this supposition likewise 
the Sabbath could not be kept according to the law, which re- 
quired a holy convocation, ^Ip-^lpD mikra-kodhesh, on, or 
for, that day, in, or among, all their dwellings, or throughout 
the whole land ; Lev. xxiii. 3. The word iOpD mikra, which 
we render a convocation, seems more naturally to import a 
place of public worship in which the people assembled than 
the assembly itself. As in the following passage of Isaiah : 
" And the Lord will create upon every dwelling place of 
mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, rwipO mikrajeha, a 
cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by 
night," chap. iv. 5 : in which there is a manifest allusion to 
the tabernacle, whereon the cloud and pillar of fire rested in 
the wilderness ; Exod. xl. 38. And what then could these 
anp *mpD mikre kodhesh be, but synagogues, or edifices for 
public worship ? # 

However, the dispute perhaps may be compromised if we 
allow that the custom of erecting those sorts of chapels, in 
later ages called synagogues, and appropriated to public wor- 
ship alone, first began after the return from the captivity ; 
and that in former times, from their first settlement in the 
land of Canaan, the people used to meet either in the open 
air, or in dwelling houses, particularly in the houses of the 
prophets (as seems to be intimated in the husband of the Shu- 
namite inquiring of her, when she was going to Elisha's house 
on occasion of the death of her son, " Wherefore wilt thou 
go to him to day? It is neither new moon nor Sabbath," 
2 Kings iv. 23), or in any other place or building convenient 
for the purpose. 

But though we cannot help concluding they had extempore 
synagogues, if we may so style them, without which religious 
assemblies could not be ordinarily held, from their first settle- 
ment in Canaan ; nevertheless, it must be acknowledged, these 
assemblies were sometimes neglected, and in a manner laid 
aside, for years together; which made it necessary for Je- 
hoshaphat to send Levites, a sort of itinerant preachers, with 
a book of the law with them, throughout the cities of Judah ; 

* See on this subject, Leydecker. de Republ. Hebr. lib. viii. cap. v. 
sect. ii. 



366 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK II. 

2 Chron. xvii. 9. And from the long disuse of reading it in 
such public assemblies, the knowledge of the law was at a very 
low ebb in Josiah's time; which may be supposed, in part, to 
have occasioned the pleasure and surprise of the king and of 
Hilkiah the high-priest, when the book, or autograph, of the 
law, which had been long neglected and lost, was found, as 
they were repairing the temple; 2 Kings xxii. 8. 

In the sixth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles there is 
mention made of the synagogue of the Libertines, ver. 9; 
concerning whom there are different opinions, two of which 
bid fairest for the truth. The first is that of Grotius and 
Vitringa,* that they were Italian Jews or proselytes. The 
ancient Romans distinguished between liberties and libertinus. 
Libertus was one who had been a slave, and obtained his free- 
dom ;f libertinus was the son of a Ubertus.% But this dis- 
tinction in after-ages was not strictly observed; and libertinus 
also came to be used for one not born, but made free, in op- 
position to ingenuus, or one born free.§ Whether the liber- 
tini mentioned in this passage of the Acts were Gentiles, who 
had become proselytes to Judaism, or native Jews, who having 
been made slaves to the Romans were afterward set at li- 
berty,|| and in remembrance of their captivity called them- 

* Grot, in loc. ; Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, lib. i. part i. cap. xiv. p. 254, 
255. 

f Cives Romani sunt Liberti, qui vindicta, censu aut testamento, nullo 
jure impediente manumissi sunt. Ulpian. tit. i. sect. vi. 

% This appears from the following passage of Suetonius concerning Clau- 
dius, who, he says, was ignarus temporibus Appii et deinceps aliquamdiu 
Libertinos dictos, non ipsos, qui manumitterentur, sed ingenuos ex his pro- 
creatos. In Vita Claudi, cap. xxiv. sect. iv. p. 78, Pitisci. 

§ Quintilian. de Institutione Oratoria, lib. v. cap. x. p. 246, edit. Gibson, 
1693. Qui servus est, si manumittatur fit Libertinus. Justinian. Institut. 
lib. i. tit. v. : Libertini sunt, qui ex justa servitute manumissi sunt. Tit. iv. 
Ingenuus est is, qui statim ut natus est, liber est ; sive ex duobus ingenuis 
matrimonio editus est, sive ex libertinis duobus, sive ex altero libertino, et 
altero ingenuo. 

|| Of these there were great numbers at Rome. Tacitus informs us (Annal. 
lib. ii. cap. lxxxv.), that four thousand Libertini of the Jewish superstition, 
as he styles it, were banished at one time, by order of Tiberius, into Sar- 
dinia ; and the rest commanded to quit Italy, if they did not abjure by a 
certain day. See also Suetonius in Vita Tiberii, cap. xxxvi.; Josephus 
(Antiq. lib. xviii. cap. iii. sect. v. edit. Haverc.) mentions the same fact; 
and Philo (Legat. ad Caium, p. 785, C, edit. Colon. 1613) speaks of a good 



( HAP. IT.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES. 



367 



selves Ubertini, and formed a synagogue by themselves, is 
differently conjectured by the learned.* 

It is probable, the Jews of Cyrenia, Alexandria, &c, built 
synagogues at Jerusalem at their own charge, for the use of 
their brethren who came from those countries ; as the Danes, 
Swedes, Sec, build churches for the use of their own country- 
men in London; and that the Italian Jews did the same; and 
because the greatest number of them were Ubertini, their 
synagogue was therefore called the synagogue of the Liber- 
tines. 

The other opinion, which is hinted by Oecumenius on the 
Acts,f and mentioned by Dr. Lardner, as more lately ad- 
vanced by Mr. Daniel Gerdes,J professor of divinity in the 
university of Groningen, is this, that the Libertines are so 
called from a city or country called Libertus, or Libertina, in 
Africa, about Carthage. Suidas, in his Lexicon, on the word 
\i(3tpTivog, says it was ovofia tOvovg, nomen gentis. And the 
glossa interlinearis, of which Nicolas de Lyra made great use 
in his notes, hath over the word Ubertini, £ regione, denoting 
that they were so styled from a country. 

In the acts of the famous conference with the Donatists at 
Carthage, anno 411, there is mentioned one Victor, bishop 
of the church of Libertina : and in the acts of the Lateran 
Council, which was held in 649, there is mention of Januarius 
gratia Dei episcopus satictce ecclesia Libertinensis ; and there- 
fore Fabricius, in his Geographical Index of Christian 
Bishoprics, has placed Libertina in what was called Africa 
Propria, or the proconsular province of Africa. Now, as all 
the other people of the several synagogues, mentioned in this 
passage of the Acts, are denominated from the places from 
whence they came ; it is probable, that the Libertines were 
so too ; and as the Cyrenians and Alexandrians, who came 
from Africa, are placed next to the Libertines in that cata- 

part of the city beyond the Tiber, as inhabited by Jews, who were mostly 
Libertini, having been brought to Rome as captives and slaves, but being 
made free by their masters, were permitted to live according to their own 
rites and customs. 

* Vid. Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. ii. cap. v. Oper. vol. i. torn. i. 
p. 200, 201 ; et Alting. de Proselytis. 
f In loc. torn. i. p. 57. 

t Vid. ejus Exercit. Academ. lib. iii. Amstel. 1728, 4to. 



368 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[liOOK II. 



logue, it is probable they also belonged to the same country. 
So that, upon the whole, there is little reason to doubt of the 
Libertines being so called from the place from whence they 
came;* and the order of the names in the catalogue might 
lead us to think, that they were farther off from Jerusalem 
than Alexandria and Cyrenia, which will carry us to the pro- 
consular province in Africa about Carthage. f 

When Godwin mentions it as a Jewish tradition, that 
wheresoever there were ten men of Israel, there ought to be 
a synagogue built, he is somewhat mistaken in the meaning 
of the tradition, which was, that a synagogue ought to be 
built where there were ten D^Dl batlanim, that is, men of 
leisure, who could take care of the affairs of the synagogue, 
and give themselves to the study of the law. So saith Light- 
foot, understanding it to be a general name for the elders or 
officers of the synagogue.]: However, others are of a dif- 
ferent opinion ; particularly Rhenferdius, who hath wrote a 
large dissertation, chiefly against Lightfoot, in order to prove 
that they were persons, who at a stated salary were obliged to 
attend the service of the synagogue at proper hours, that 
whoever came might find a sufficient number to make a lawful 
congregation, which the Jews imagine must consist, at least, 
of ten.§ 

In the synagogue, saith Godwin, the scribes ordinarily 
taught ; but not only they, for Christ himself also taught in 
them. It is queried, by what right Christ and his apostles, 
who had no public character among the Jews, taught in their 
synagogues ? In answer to which, Dr. Lightfoot observes, 
that though this liberty was allowed to no illiterate person or 

* It is surprising that this opinion should be rejected by Mr. Selden, since 
he hath not only mentioned it, but quoted on the occasion the passages here 
produced out of Suidas, the Glossa Interlinearis, and the Acts of the Con- 
ference at Carthage. De Jure Nat. et Gent., ubi supra. 

f See Dr. Lardner's Case of the Demoniacs, p. 152 — 156. 

% Vid. Lightfoot, Hor. Hebr. in Mat. iv. 23. 

§ Vid. Rhenferdii Dissertationes Philolog. de Decern Otiosis Synagogee, 
Franekras, 1686, 4to. ; Vitring. de Decemviris Otiosis, Franek. 1687, in de- 
fence of what he had advanced in his Archisynagog. Franeker. 1685, cap. ii. 
iii. et eundem de Synagog. Vetere, lib. ii. cap. vi. — viii., where he shows 
at large the grounds of Lightfoot's opinion, more fully than he had done him- 
self, but leaves the dispute undetermined. 



t'HAP. II.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES. 



369 



mechanic, but only to the learned ; they nevertheless granted 
it to prophets, and workers of miracles, and such as set up for 
heads and leaders of new sects;* I suppose, in order that 
they might inform themselves of their dogmata, and not con- 
demn them unheard and unknown. And under all these 
characters, Christ and his apostles were admitted to this 
privilege. 

He that gave liberty to preach was termed Apyiavvayuyog '■> 
which word is sometimes used in a larger sense, for any one 
of the officers who had power in the affairs of the synagogue. 
Thus in the thirteenth chapter of the Acts, ver. 15, we read 
of the Apyivvvayuyoi, rulers of one synagogue. Sometimes 
it is used in a stricter sense, for the president or chief of those 
officers ; as in the following passage of St. Luke : " And the 
ruler of the synagogue, Apxivvvaywyog, answered with in- 
dignation, because that Jesus had healed on the sabbath-day;" 
chap. xiii. 14. And perhaps in these passages of the Acts : 
" And Crispus, the chief ruler of the synagogue, Apyiawayw- 
yog, believed on the Lord with all his house," chap, xviii. 8: 
again, " All the Greeks took Sosthenes, the chief ruler of the 
synagogue, Apyjiovv ay wyog, and beat him before the judg- 
ment-seat;" ver. 17. 

Next to the Apx^vvaywyoQ was an officer, whose province 
it was to offer up public prayer to God for the whole congre- 
gation, and who on that account was called "nnjf n^i!> sheliach 
zibbor, the angel of the church,f because, as their messenger, 
he spoke to God for them. Hence the pastors of the seven 
churches of Asia, in the book of the Revelation, are called 
by a name borrowed from the synagogue, " angels of the 
churches." Dr. Lightfoot makes this officer to be the same 
with the r Yirrj|0£r7?c>t mentioned in the fourth chapter of St. 
Luke, and by our translators rendered te minister;" ver. 20. 
He also confounds it with the \\n chazan,% as Vitringa did 

* Lightfoot, Hor. Hebr. in Matt. iv. 23, ad finem. 

f Mish. Rosh Hasshanah, cap: iv. sect. ix. ; Maimon. etBartenor. in loc. 
torn. ii. p. 353, edit. Surenhus. ; et Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part 
ii. cap. i. p. 889 — 895, et cap. ii. p. 905, et seq. 

I See his Harmony on Luke iv. 20. 

§ See his Harmony on Luke iv. 15, sect. iv. 

2 B 



370 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[hook II. 



when he wrote his Archisynagogus,* but on maturer conside- 
ration he afterward altered his opinion. 

The chazan, I apprehend, was, generally at least, a different 
officer from the sheliach zibbor, and inferior to him. Some 
understand the word chazan to answer to the Greek Siaicovogrf 
but according to the account the rabbies give of his office,J it 
should answer to the English word sexton; for he was the 
servant of the synagogue, as Dr. Doddridge on the forecited 
passage of St. Luke translates the word 'Y-n-YiptTrig, seeming to 
understand it, as most interpreters do, of the chazan. 

The worship performed in the synagogue consisted of three 
parts, — reading the Scriptures, prayer, and preaching. 

The Scriptures they read were the whole law of Moses, 
and portions out of the prophets, and hagiographa. 

The law was divided into fifty-three, according to the 
Masorets, or, according to others, fifty-four mi2HD parashoth, 
or sections. For the Jewish year consisted of twelve lunar 
months, alternately of twenty-nine or thirty days, that is, of 
fifty weeks and four days. The Jews, therefore, in their divi- 
sion of the law into parashoth, or sections, had a respect to 
their intercalary year, which was every second or third, and 
consisted of thirteen months; so that the whole law was read 
over this year, alloting one pa rashah, or section, to every sab- 
bath. And in common years they reduced the fifty-three or 
fifty-four sections to the number of the fifty sabbaths, by read- 
ing two shorter ones together, as often as there was occasion. 
They began the course of reading the first sabbath after the 
feast of tabernacles; or rather, indeed, on the sabbath-day 
before that, when they finished the last course of reading, they 
also made a beginning of the new course ;§ that so, as the 
rabbies say, the devil might not accuse them to God of being 
weary of reading his law.|| 
* Archisynag. p. 58, et seq. 

f Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part. ii. cap. iv. p. 914, et seq. 

X Vid. Mishn. Sotah, cap. vii. sect, vii.; Bartenor. et Wagenseil. in loc. 
torn. iii. p. 266, edit. Surenhus.; Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, ubi supra, cap. 
ii. p. 895, et seq. 

§ See Vitringa de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part ii. cap. viii. p. 964, et seq.; 
Leusden. Philolog. Hebr. dissert, iv. 
|| Leusden, ubi supra, sect. xx. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES. 



371 



The portions selected out of the prophets are called nniDDH 
haphtaroth. The tradition* is, that when Antiochus Epipha- 
nes forbad them reading the law in their synagogues, they 
picked out portions of the prophets, somewhat answering in 
sense to those of the law,f and read them on the same days 
when the other should have been read.j; 

The second part of the synagogue service was prayer. For 
the performance of which, saith Dr. Prideaux, they had litur- 
gies, in which are ail the prescribed forms of the synagogue 
worship. The most solemn part of these prayers are eighteen 
collects, which, according to the rabbies, were composed and 
instituted by Ezra, in order that the Jews, whose language 
after the captivity was corrupted with many barbarous terms, 
borrowed from other languages, might be able to perform their 
devotions in the pure language of their own country. This is 
the account which Maimonides gives out of the Gemara, of 
the origin of the Jewish liturgies. § And the eighteen col- 

* Elias Levita, in Thisbi ad Rad. "HDD. See the passage quoted by Vi- 
tringa, de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part ii. cap. xi. p. 1006. This tradition of 
the origin of reading the haphtaroth is very improbable, as Vitringa shows, 
p. 1007, 1008. 

f That the passages of the prophets were to be similar to those of the 
law we are informed by Maimonides de Precibus, cap. xiii. sect, iii.; see 
Vitring. p. 985, 986. 

% See a table of the Parashoth and Haphtaroth in Maimon. de Ordine 
Precum in de Voisin. Observat. ad Raymundi Martini Pugionem Fidei, 
Procem. p. 80, et seq. p. 108, et seq., or at the end of Athias's Hebrew- 
Bible. 

It is debated among learned men, whether the Greek version of the Sep- 
tuagint was anciently used in the synagogues of those Jews who were not 
well versed in the Hebrew ; or whether the original alone was read to them, 
and then interpreted. We have already declared our opinion, that the Hel- 
lenists, mentioned in the Acts, were Jews, who used the Greek version in 
sacris, or in their synagogues. See, on the other side of the question, Vi- 
tringa (de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part ii. cap. vii. p. 950 — 958), who hath 
laboured to prove, against Scaliger (Animadvers. ad Eusebii Chronicon, p. 
134) and Walton (Prolegom. ix. sect. xiv. p. 60), that no Greek version 
was ever used in any Jewish synagogues. In support of the opinion we 
have espoused, besides Scaliger and Walton, see in particular, Hody de 
Bibliorum Textibus, lib. iii. part i. cap. i. p. 224 — 233. 

§ Maimon. de Precibus et Benedict. Sacerdot. cap. i. sect. i. — ix. ex Gem. 
tit. Barachoth, fol. xxxiii. col. i.; et Megill. fol. xviii. col. ii.; see Vitringa, 
lib. i. part ii. cap. xii. p. 414 — 416. 

2 b 2 



372 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



lects, in particular, are mentioned in the Mishna.* However, 
some better evidence than that of the talmudical rahbies is 
requisite in order to prove their liturgies to be of so high an 
antiquity; especially when some of their prayers, as Dr. Pri- 
deaux acknowledges, seem to have been composed after the 
destruction of Jerusalem, and to have reference to it.f It is 
evident they were composed when there was no temple, nor 
sacrifices ; since the seventeenth collect prays, that God would 
restore his worship to the inner part of his house, and make 
haste with fervour and love to accept the burnt sacrifices of 
Israel, &c.J They could not, therefore, be the composition 
of Ezra, who did not receive his commission from Artaxerxes 
to go to Judea till more than fifty years after the second 
temple was built, and its worship restored. However, Dr. 
Prideaux, not doubting but they were used, at least most of 
them, in our Saviour's time, and consequently that he joined 
in them,§ whenever he went into the synagogues, as he did 
every sabbath-day, Luke iv. 16, infers from hence two things, 
as he saith, for the consideration of Dissenters. 

1st. " That our Saviour disliked not set forms of prayer in 
public worship." 

2dly. " That he was content to join with the public in the 
meanest forms (for such he allows these Jewish forms to be) 

* Mishn. tit. Barachoth, cap. iv. sect. iii. p. 14, edit. Surenhus. 

f Connect, part i. book vi. vol. ii. p. 538, note d, 10th edit. 1729. 

I Prideaux, ubi supra, p. 541, 542. The fifth, tenth, eleventh, and four- 
teenth collects have the same allusion and reference as the seventeenth. 
See the original prayers in Maimonides de Ordine Precum; or in Vitringa 
(de Synag. Vetere, lib. iii. part ii. cap. xiv. p. 1033 — 1038), who observes, 
that the Talmudists will have the seventeenth collect, which prays for the 
restoration of the temple worship (reduc ministerium Leviticum in Adytum 
Domus tuse, as he translates it), to have been usually recited by the king in 
the temple at the feast of tabernacles ; which is such an absurdity, that it 
confutes itself, and shows how little the Jewish traditions concerning the 
antiquity and use of their liturgies are to be depended upon. 

§ Supposing these forms were used in our Saviour's time, it will not fol- 
low, that he joined in them, or worshipped God by them, because he fre- 
quently attended the Jewish synagogues ; which he might do for other reasons. 
And indeed many of them, as the author of the Letter to Dr. Prideaux in the 
Occasional Paper (vol. iii. numb. iii. p. 14 — 17) justly observes and shows, 
were such as he cannot be supposed to have joined in, not being consistent 
with his character and circumstances. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES. 



373 



rather than separate from it." " And this," says he, " may 
satisfy our Dissenters, that neither our using set forms of 
prayer in our public worship, nor the using of such forms as 
they think not sufficiently edifying, can be objection sufficient 
to justify them in their refusal to join with us in the use of 
them."*' 

As both these inferences are built upon the supposition, 
that forms of prayer were used in the Jewish church in our 
Saviour's time, if that cannot be satisfactorily proved, they 
stand upon a very precarious foundation. And though the 
Doctor is pleased to say there is no doubt of it, yet, unless he 
could produce some better and earlier evidence than the tal- 
mudical rabbies, I think there is great reason to withhold our 
assent. If they were in use so early as the Jewish writers 
pretend, it is strange there should be no hint of it in the Old 
Testament and in the Apocrypha ; and if they came into use 
in or before our Saviour's time, some intimation of it might 
naturally have been expected in the New Testament. Nor 
is the total silence of Josephus and Philo, and all other 
writers previous to the talmudical rabbies, easy to be ac- 
counted for on supposition that such liturgical forms were 
then in use. 

However, granting they were then used, and that our Sa- 
viour ordinarily attended the Jewish public worship, at that 
time very corrupt, and loaded with ceremonies of mere human 
invention ; it may, nevertheless, be doubted how far his ex- 
ample in this case will oblige us to join with a national church 
in any forms of worship, which we apprehend to be corrupted 
from the divine institution : for, 

1st. Though our blessed Saviour, for wise reasons, was pre- 
sent at the corrupt worship of the Jewish church, he frequently 
remonstrated against their corruptions. The argument, there- 
fore, drawn from hence, for our complying with human in- 
ventions and corruptions in the worship of God, seems not 
quite remote from that which Cardinal Bellarmine uses for 
the worship of angels ; "St. John fell down before an angel, 
in order to worship him ; and why are we blamed for doing 

* The same argument is used by Dr. Whitby on Luke iv. 16; by Arch- 
bishop Tillotson, serm. cxxxv. vol. iii. p. 227, fol.; by Dr. Bennet, in his 
Brief History of Forms of Prayer, chap. i. — iii., and by several others. 



374 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 11. 



what St. John did ?" To which Archbishop Tillotson properly 
replies, Because St. John was reproved by the anoel for doing: 
what he did. In like manner when we are asked, why we 
cannot comply w T ith corrupt forms and human inventions, as 
Christ did ? — we may reply, Because he remonstrated against 
such corrupt forms and human inventions, and reproved the 
Jews for them. Indeed, if this argument proves any thing, it 
proves too much; it proves that we must not onlv complv with 
corrupt modes and forms in divine worship, but that we must 
at the same time continue to bear our testimony against such 
corruptions ; and this, we apprehend, would not only be dis- 
agreeable to our Christian brethren with whom we differ, but 
would ordinarily be the cause of more uncharitable conten- 
tions, and give a more mortal wound to the peace of the 
church, for the sake of preserving which the example of Christ 
is so strongly urged upon us, than a quiet and peaceable sepa- 
ration. Not to add, 

2dly. That if we are under an obligation, from the example 
of Christ, to comply with the established worship in any na- 
tion, I apprehend we must be under the like obligation to 
comply w T ith it in every nation, to be Episcopalians or Pres- 
byterians, Papists or Protestants, according to the law and 
constitution of the country in which we reside. 

3dly. Though our Saviour for a time complied with the 
corrupt worship of the Jewish church, he nevertheless after- 
ward dissented, and set up another church, and another foim, 
in opposition to theirs ; enjoining on his disciples a noncon- 
formity to the rites of the Jewish church, and a strict and close 
adherence to him as their lawgiver, and to his institutions as 
their rule, and not to suffer themselves to be again entangled 
with the yoke of carnal and ceremonial ordinances, but to stand 
fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made them free ; to 
own and submit to his authority alone as obligatory on con- 
science, and to oppose every usurpation on his sovereigntv, 
and every invasion of the rights of his subjects. Which leads 
me to observe, 

4thly. That the argument is built on this mistaken prin- 
ciple, that the Church of England is a national established 
church, on the same, or as good authority as the Jewish 
church was. That, indeed, was a divine establishment ; and 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SYNAGOGUES. 



375 



all persons born in the land of Israel, and of Jewish parents, 
being considered as members of it, were therefore bound to 
conform to its rites and worship, at least so far as they were 
consonant to the divine institution. But is there a divine 
establishment of any national church under the gospel dis- 
pensation ? If the New Testament gives us no other idea of 
the churches of Christ, but their being voluntary societies, 
uniting, under the laws of Christ, for public worship, and 
other purposes of religion ; then is no man born a member of 
any church, but every one is at liberty to join himself to that, 
whose constitution and worship appear to him most agreeable 
to the rule of Scripture, and most for his own edification. 
And since the unity which the gospel recommends does not 
consist in the uniformity of rites and modes of worship, but 
in harmony of affection, and in the mutual love of all Chris- 
tians ; it follows, that the peace of the church is not broken 
by quiet and conscientious nonconformists, but by those who 
are bitter and violent against their fellow-christians for not 
approving those human forms of which they are fond and 
tenacious.* 

The third part of their synagogue service was expounding 
the Scriptures, and preaching to the people. The posture in 
which this was performed, whether in the synagogue or other 
places (see Matt. v. 1, and Luke v. 3), was sitting. Accord- 
ingly, when our Saviour had read the nntODn haphtaroth, in 
the synagogue at Nazareth, of which he was a member, hav- 
ing been brought up in that city ; and then, instead of retiring 
to his place, sat down in the desk or pulpit, it is said, " the 
eyes of all that were present were fastened upon him," as 
they perceived by his posture that he was going to preach to 
them ; Luke iv. 20. And when Paul and Barnabas went into 
the synagogue at Antioch, and sat down, thereby intimating 
their desire to speak to the people, if they might be permitted, 
the rulers of the synagogue sent to them, and gave them 
leave; Acts xiii. 14, 15. 

* See Mr. Robinson's Review of the case of Liturgies, in answer to Dr. 
Bennet, chap. iii. p. 49, et seq.; and the Letter to Dr.Prideaux in the Occa- 
sional Paper, vol. iii. numb. iii. 

If any are desirous of being acquainted with the Jewish forms, and with 
their manner of discharging the duty of public prayer, as described by the 
rabbies, they may have ample satisfaction in Vitringa, de Synag. Vetere, lib. 
iii. part ii. cap. xiii. — xviii., or in Buxtorf. de Synag. Judaica. 



376 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK Hi 



The synagogues were used, not only for divine service, but 
for holding courts of justice, especially upon ecclesiastical 
affairs. And as among us, lesser punishments are often in- 
flicted in the court, as soon as judgment is given, for instance, 
burning in the hand ; so among the Jews, the punishment of 
beating or whipping was often inflicted in the synagogue, 
while the court was sitting : see Matt. x. 17 ; Luke xii. 11 ; 
Acts xxii. 19. 

To this use of the synagogues, for holding judiciary courts, 
Dr. Whitby thinks St. James refers, when he says, " If there 
come into your assembly, eig t»jv away toy qv vfiujv, a man 
with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a 
poor man in vile raiment ; and ye have respect to him that 
weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in 
a good place ; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit 
here under my footstool ; are ye not partial in yourselves, and 
are become judges of evil thoughts," or judges who think and 
reason ill ? James ii. 2 — 4. That the apostle here speaks of 
consistories for civil judicature is argued, 1st. From the use of 
the word <rvvaywyr), which never signifies in the New Testa- 
ment an assembly of Christian worshippers. 2dly. From the 
word TTpoGOJTroXir^ia being used to express the partiality here 
censured, in the clause immediately preceding : u My bre- 
thren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord 
of glory, with respect of persons, ev raig TrpoawiroX-q^iaiQ,'" 
ver. 1. Now this term is most commonly, if not always, used 
for a partial respect of persons in judgment ; like the instance 
here mentioned, favouring a rich man's cause before a poor 
man's. 3dly. The phrase 11 Sit thou under my footstool," 
ver. 3, most naturally refers to courts of justice; where the 
judge is commonly exalted upon a higher seat than the rest of 
the assembly ; but it cannot be well applied to assemblies of 
worshippers. 4thly. The apostle's accusing them, on account 
of this conduct toward the poor, with being partial judges, 
ver. 4 ; and reminding them, that the rich were the persons 
who "drew them before the judgment- seats," ver. 6, seems 
very natural, if we understand him in the preceding passage 
as discoursing; concerning: courts of judicature. 5thlv. The 
apostle says, such a respect of persons as he here speaks of, 
is contrary to the law, and those who are guilty of it are 
ft convinced of the law as transgressors ver. 9. Now there 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SCHOOLS. 



377 



was no divine law against distinction of places in worshipping 
assemblies, into those which were more or less honourable ; 
this must therefore, no doubt, refer to the law of parti- 
ality in judgment : "Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judg- 
ment ; thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor ho- 
nour the person of the mighty;" Lev. xix. 15: see also Deut. 
i. 17. The talmudists say, # it was a rule, that when " a poor 
man and a rich man pleaded together in judgment, the rich 
should not be bid to sit down, and the poor to stand ; but 
either both shall sit, or both shall stand." To this rule, or 
custom, the apostle seems to refer, when he insinuates a 
charge against them, of saying to the rich man, " Sit thou 
here in a good place, and to the poor, Stand thou there;" 
James ii. 3. 

So that, upon the whole, by the synagogue is not here 
meant, as is commonly understood, the church assembly for 
worship, but a court of judicature, in which men are too apt 
to favour the cause of the rich against the poor. 

With respect to the schools amongst the Jews, it should be 
observed, that besides the common schools, in which children 
were taught to read the law, they had also academies, in 
which their doctors gave comments on the law, and taught 
the traditions to their pupils. Of this sort were the two 
famous schools of Hillel and Shammai, and the school of 
Gamalial, who was Paul's tutor ; Acts xxii. 3. In these semi- 
naries the tutor's chair is said to have been so much raised 
above the level of the floor, on which the pupils sat, that his 
feet were even with their heads. Hence St. Paul says, that 
" he was brought up at the feet of Gamaliel." These acade- 
mies were commonly furnished with several tutors, of whom 
one was president, and from whom the school was denomi- 
nated. They were called ^IQI-nva beth-rabbonin ; whereas the 
inferior schools were called pn-JTO betli-rabban, as having 
only one master. 

The doctors in these academies not only read lectures to 
their pupils, but held disputations or conferences, at which 
other persons might be present, and propose questions to 
them. It was perhaps in one of those schools, which were 

* Vid. Hottinger. de Juris Hebrseor. Legibus, leg. ccxlii. p. 364, edit. 
Tigur. 1655. 



378 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



kept in some apartment in the courts of the temple, that 
Mary found her young son Jesus, " sitting in the midst of 
the doctors, both hearing and asking them questions;" Luke 
ii. 46. Or it might be even in the Sanhedrim, which, Dr. 
Lightfoot says, was the great school of the nation, as well as 
the great judicatory . # 

In order to prove that these schools were different from 
the synagogues, Godwin observes, that Paul, having disputed 
for the space of three months in the synagogue, " because 
divers believed not, but spake evil of that way, then departed 
from them, and separated his disciples, disputing daily in the 
school of one Tyrannus;" Acts xix. 8 — 10. This argument 
is grounded on a supposition, that this school of Tyrannus was 
a Jewish academy ; which is very unlikely, considering it was 
at Ephesus. Besides, it does not seem probable, that, on ac- 
count of the Jews opposing and blaspheming the gospel, St. 
Paul should merely retire from a Jewish synagogue to a Jew- 
ish school. Was he likely to meet with less opposition amongst 
the same people by teaching in a different place? The truth 
seems to be, that he departed from the Jews, as being under 
obstinate and invincible prejudices, and taught among the 
Gentiles, in the school of one Tyrannus; and that for the 
space of two years : so that all the inhabitants of Asia heard 
the word of the Lord, Greeks as well as Jews. Some take 
Tyrannus to be the proper name of a Gentile philosopher, 
who favoured St. Paul, and lent him his school to preach and 
dispute in; others, to be a title or name of place or office, 
rvpavvog signifying, in the Greek language, a king or prince ; 
and accordingly the Chaldee Paraphrase, which often borrows 
words both from the Greek and Latin, renders the Hebrew 
word sy^o zarne, which we translate lords in the books of 
Joshua and Judges (Josh. xiii. 3; Judges xvi. 5. 8), by "OTiD 
turnl. Thus Phavorinus interprets rvpavvog by apx<*>v TrwXtwg. 
It may, therefore, in this place signify a magistrate; which 
interpretation seems to be favoured by the addition of nvog. 
Nevertheless it must be owned, nvogis sometimes joined with 
a proper name; as riva ^ifiojva, Mark xv. 21, and TtprvWov 
Tivog, Acts xxiv. 1. However, if by rvpavvov nvog w^e under- 
stand a certain magistrate of Ephesus, ctxoAij may signify his 
* Lightfoot, Harmony on John iii. 10. 



CHAP. II.] 



THE PROSEUCH^i. 



379 



hall or gallery, in which people used to meet for discourse : a 
sense in which the word is very commonly used both by the 
Greeks and Latins. Others, again, take trxoXr) here to sig- 
nify a yvfAvaaiov, in which wrestlers and other combatants in 
the public games exercised themselves ; and which, perhaps, 
had been built at the expense of one Tyrannus, and therefore 
bore his name.* 

With respect to their oratories, or irpoGEv\aL, it is a question 
among the learned, whether they were different from their 
schools or synagogues. It is said, that our Saviour " went 
up into a mountain to pray, and continued all night," ev rrj 
irpoGtvxn tov Qeov, which can hardly bear the sense our trans- 
lators have put upon it, " in prayer to God ;" Luke vi. 12 
Beza indeed renders it, " pernoctavit illic, orans Deum;" but 
acknowledges he is forced to depart from the Greek, " ut 
planius loqueretur." But Dr. Whitby infers from the use of 
parallel phrases, such as " the mount of God," " the bread 
of God," " the altar of God," " the lamp of God," which 
are all of them things consecrated or appropriated to the ser- 
vice of God, that wpoaevxn tov Qeov might in like manner sig- 
nify " an oratory of God," or a place that was devoted to his 
service, especially for prayer. In the same sense he under- 
stands the word in the passage of the Acts, wherein we are 
informed, that Paul and his companions, on the sabbath-day, 
went out of the city by a river side, ov zvo/uliZeto irpoaivyy] uvai, 
which we render, " where prayer was wont to be made." But 
the Syriac renders it, " quoniam illic videbatur domus preca- 
tionis ;" — because there was perceived to be a house of prayer : 
and the Arabic, " ad locum quendam qui putabatur esse locus 
orationis — to a certain place, which was supposed to be a 
place of prayer : ov tvofiiZtro, where there was taken, or feigned 
to bef — o r where, according to received custom, there was J — or 
where there was allowed by law,§ — a proseucha, or oratory, 

* Vid. Stephani Thesaurus in verb. Schola. 

f Mede's Diatrib. disc, xviii. p. 67, of his Works. And De Dieu, Ani- 
madvers. in Acta xvi. 13. 

X Eisner. Observ. Sacr. in loc, where he opposes Bos, who (in his Exer- 
citat. Philolog. in loc.) had endeavoured to show, that svofii&To was redun- 
dant, and that the passage ought to be translated simply, " where there was 
a proseucha." 

§ Lardner's Credibil. part i. vol. i. book i. cap. iii. sect. hi. p. 239, 



380 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK If. 



and where, therefore, they expected to meet an assembly of 
people. Mr. Mede observes, that it should have been ov 
tvofAiZeTo irpoatvyr) yivecrSai, not uvai, to express where prayer 
was wont to be made : and De Dieu seems to be of the same 
opinion. 

That the Jews had houses, or places for prayer, called 
TrpoGzvyai, appears from a variety of passages in Philo;* and 
particularly in his oration against Flaccus he complains, that 
their Trpoozvyai were pulled down, and there was no place left 
in which they might worship God and pray for Caesar. f And 
Josephus, in his Life, mentions the proseuchse more than 
once, and speaks of the people's being gathered ug rr\v irpo- 
<rtvxnv.% To the same purpose is the following passage of 
Juvenal, if he be rightly understood by Godwin, Vitringa,§ 
and others : — 

Ede ubi consistas ; in qua te quaero Proseucha ? 

Sat. iii. 1. 296-H 



3d edit. 1741. Erasmus Schmidius (in loc.) supports this sense of tvoiultro 
by some passages in Aristophanes. Consult Scapula and Constantine in 
verb. 

* Vid. in Flaccum, et Legat. ad Caium passim. 

f Phil, in Flacc. apud Opera, p. 752, F, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. 

% Joseph, in Vit. sect. liv. et lvi. p. 27, torn. ii. edit. Haverc. 

§ Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, lib. i. part i. cap. iv. p. 119. 

|| The late learned Mr. Samuel Jones, of Tewkesbury, in his MS. Lectures 
on Godwin, hath the following note on this passage of Juvenal : — 

" Autor noster et etiam Vitringa aliique poetam his verbis Synagogam 
Judseorum innuisse putant. Sed aliter mihi videtur. Nam in hoc loco de 
Judaeis nil habet; inducit vero Umbritium, Romanum quidem, non Ju- 
daeum, de contumeliis, quibus pauperes afficiebant ebrii petulantesque ju- 
venes, conquerentem, et referentem verba talium juvenum rogantium pau- 
perem quendam, a quo conches et porra mendicasset, et quo in loco ad 
mendicandum stare assuetus erat. Quinetiam haud verisimile est Romanos 
mendicandi causa synagogas frequentasse, quum ipsi tunc temporis pauper- 
rimi habebantur et mendici, ut ex hoc ipso aliisque constat poetis. Insuper 
quum poeta dicit ; in qua te quaero Proseucha ? Innuit, quod plurimae erant 
tunc temporis Romae Proseuchae. Non autem verisimile est plurimas ibi 
fuisse synagogas, quia Judsei tunc temporis pauperes erant et exosi et saepe 
ab Imperatoribus longe ab urbe discedere jussi. 

" Turnebus, ut hanc quag autoris est sententiam probet, citat locum Cleo- 
medis. Extat ille locus, lib. ii. p. 204, KvkXiktiq Bsojpiag neStwpwv, ubi Epi- 
curum in sua, de qua gloriabatur, locutione vocibus corruptis, ridiculis et 
absurdis usum fuisse dicit ; quarum quasdam perstringit, quasi ano uteris rtjg 



CHAP. IT.] 



THE PROSEUCHiE. 



381 



Among those who make the synagogues and proseuchss to 
be different places, are the learned Mr. Joseph Mede # and 
Dr. Prideaux;f and they think the difference consists, partly, 
in the form of the edifice ; a synagogue, they say, being adifi- 
cium tectum, like our houses, or churches ; and a proseucha 
being only encompassed with a wall, or some other mound or 
enclosure, and open at the top, like our courts. % They make 
them to differ in situation ; synagogues being in towns and 
cities, proseuchae in the fields, and frequently by the river 
side.§ Dr. Prideaux mentions another distinction, in respect 

7rpo<xtv%riQ teat tojv t-rr avrt\g TzpoaiTovvTisiV lovdaiKa riva /cat TrapaKix a P a y~ 
fisva Kai Kara tto\v tcjv ep7rsriov raTruvoTtpa. Sed de Synagogis Judaeorum 
non videtur loqui. Tempore enim Epicuri, nempe circa Ptolomaei Philadel- 
phi aetatem, lingua Graeca in synagogis, dum precabantur, usos fuisse Judaeos, 
haud verisimile est; et si usi fuissent, an eas Epicurus, homo gentilis et irre- 
ligiosus, frequentaret, ut hide verba depromeret? Etsi itafecisset, an necesse 
esset eae voces essent corruptee et humiles? Porro, quod non de synagogis, 
sed de locis ubi mendicantes stabant, egit, constare mihi videtur ex voce 
7rpoaiTovvTix)v, quae non in synagogis precantibus, optime vero alibi mendi- 
cantibus, convenit. Nec quicquam est hoc in loco, quod cujusquam in ani- 
mum suspicionem induceret, Cleomedem de Jud3eis egisse, nissi sola vox 
lovdaiKa. Sed ut ea vox hie videtur absurda, et a contextu aliena, ita nullus 
dubito, quin corrupta est. In versione de Judceis ne verbum quidem ; 
lovdaiKa autem redditur 6 vulgaria versionis igitur autor non legit lovdaiKa, 
sed IdtojTiKa, aut talem aliquam vocem. Eodem modo ex itficoj/, Act. xxiv. 
23, aliqui conflaverunt lovdanov, ut in quibusdam editionibus extat, et ad 
locum notat Erasmus — Tipootvxn ideo apud profanos hosce autores erat locus 
publicus, in quo pauperes stipem petebant." 
* Ubi supra, p. 65, et seq. 

f Connect, part i. book vi. vol. ii. p. 556, et seq. 10th edit. 

% See the account which Epiphanius gives of the Jewish Proseuchae, 
Haeres. lib. iii. torn. ii. haeres. lxxx. sect. i. Oper. vol. i. p. 1067, 1068, edit. 
Petav. 

§ See a decree of the people of Halicarnassus, in favour of the Jews 
(Joseph, Antiq. lib. xiv. cap. x. sect, xxiii. p. 712, edit. Haverc.), in which 
are the following words — dedoKTairip.iv lovdaiwv rovg (5ov\op.evovg — Tag 717)0- 
cevxag TTOttcrSrai 7rpog ry SaXaaG-g Kara to Trarpiov e9og. The custom of 
building proseuchae by the water-side seems to have been derived from 
another custom of the Jews, namely, their washing before prayer (vid. 
Eisner. Observ. Sacr. in Acts xvi. 13), though De Dieu supposes it to be 
derived from the example of Isaac. There is a remarkable passage in Philo, 
which shows how fond the Jews were of praying by the sides of rivers, or on 
the sea-shore, Phil, in Flacc. p. 760, D, E, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613; see 
also deVit. Mosis, lib. ii. p. 510, F; and Tertuliian (ad Nationes, lib. i. cap. 



382 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



to the service performed in them; in synagogues, he saith,the 
prayers were offered up in public forms in common for the 
whole congregation; but in the proseuchae they prayed, as in 
the temple, every one apart for himself. And thus our 
Saviour prayed in the proseucha into which he entered. 

Yet, after all, the proof in favour of this notion is not so 
strong, but that it still remains a question with some, whether 
the synagogues and the proseuchae were any thing more than 
two different names for the same place ; the one taken from 
the people's assembling in them, the other from the service to 
which they were more immediately appropriated; namely, 
prayer. Nevertheless, the name proseuchae will not prove, 
that they were appropriated only to prayer, and therefore 
were different from synagogues, in which the Scriptures were 
also read, and expounded ; since the temple, in which sacrifices 
were offered, and all the parts of divine service were per- 
formed, is called oikoq TrpoatvyiK, a house of prayer; Matt, 
xxi. 13. And we find St. Paul preaching in the proseuchae 
at Philippi, in the forecited passage of the Acts, chap xvi. 13. 
Dr. Prideaux acknowledges, that in our Saviour's time syna- 
gogues were called by the same name with the proseuchae; 
and so both Joseph us # and Philof seem to use the word. J 
Mr. Mede lays great stress upon that passage in the book of 
Joshua, wherein he is said " to set up a pillar under an oak 
that was by the sanctuary of the Lord," chap. xxiv. 26, to 
prove, that there were proseuchae, even in Joshua's time, dis- 
tinct from the tabernacle ; arguing, that because the law ex- 
pressly forbad planting trees near to God's altar, Deut. xvi. 21, 

xiii. Oper. p. 50, edit. Rigalt.), among several Jewish rites, mentions Ora- 
tiones litorales. 

* See the passages before quoted from the Life of Josephus, where the 
proseucha, in which the people assembled in a great multitude, seems to 
have been the great synagogue at Tiberias. 

f Philo speaks of many proseuchse in the city of Alexandria : ttoWcli de 
{irpoatvicai sc.) ftcrt kcl$ tKaarov r\ir\\ia ttjq ttoXswq (Legat. ad Caium, p. 782, 
F); and of one in particular, which he styles fisyiGrr} /cat Trepicr?/ fxoraTT) (p. 
783, A); and it was, no doubt, that very celebrated and magnificent syna- 
gogue of which the Jerusalem Talmud gives a very pompous description. 
Vid. Vitring. lib. i. part i. cap. xiv. p. 256. 

t Vid. Vitring. de Synag. Vetere, lib. i. part i. cap. iv. p. 119 — 129; et 
Witsii Meletem. de Vit. Pauli, sect. v. vi. p. 70, 71. 



chap, ii.] 



THE PROSEUCHiE. 



383 



therefore this sanctuary of the Lord by the oak could not be 
the tabernacle, which had the altar by it, but was one of the 
proseuchae, which were very often inclosed with trees. # But 
Bishop Patrick observes, that though it was sinful to plant 
trees near to God's altar, it was not so to set up the sanctuary 
under or near the trees which had been planted before, espe- 
cially when it was done only for a short time. And he farther 
remarks, that the words " by," or, as it may be rendered, in 
" the sanctuary of the Lord," do not necessarily refer to the 
oak, but may be connected with " the book of the law of 
God," mentioned in the former clause : " Joshua wrote these 
words in the book of the law of God (and took a great stone, 
and set it up under an oak), that was by, or in, the sanctuary 
of the Lord :" that is, he wrote these words in the book of the 
law of God, that was in the sanctuary of the Lord ; the inter- 
mediate words being inserted in a parenthesis. There is a 
similar instance of a remote connexion in the following pas- 
sage of the book of Genesis: " And Lot lifted up his eyes, 
and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered 
every where, before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, 
even as the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, as 
thou comest unto Zoar," Gen. xiii. 10; where the connexion 
is, he " beheld all the plain of Jordan, as thou comest unto 
Zoar, that it was well watered every where," &c. 

* Philo, Legat. ad Caium, p. 782, F, Tag fiev (irpoaevKai) edevdpoTopriaav. 



CHAPTER III. 



OF THE GATES OF JERUSALEM AND OF THE TEMPLE. 

Jerusalem, saith Godwin, had nine gates; or rather, ac- 
cording to the authors of the Universal History, ten; five 
from west to east-by-south, and five from west to east-by- 
north. 

By south. By north. 

1. Dung-gate. 1. Valley-gate. 

2. Fountain-gate. 2. Gate of Ephraim. 

3. Water-gate. 3. Old-gate. 

4. Horse-gate. 4. Fish-gate. 

5. Prison-gate, or miphkadh. 5. Sheep-gate. 

This account is very little, if any thing, different from the plan 
of the city prefixed to the Polyglot. But Hottinger, in his 
notes on Godwin, # hath given a very different description of 
the situation of these gates, which he endeavours to trace by 
the account of the order in which they were erected after the 
captivity, in the book of Nehemiah ; where the sheep-gate is 
mentioned first, which he places on the west side of the city, 
and toward the south; principally for these two reasons; be- 
cause he supposes it was the same with the gate which Jose- 
phus calls ttvXyi ea<jriv(i)v, that is, not the gate of the Essenes, 
it being improbable that a gate of the city, which must of 
course be common to all sorts of persons, should be called by 
the name of a particular sect; but the word Josephus uses is, 
he imagines, only the Hebrew word |NJfn hatsan, ovis, with a 
Greek termination; and if so, ttwAii egg-vvuv, which Josephus 
saith was on the west side of the city, literally signifies the 
sheep-gate. Another reason for his assigning it this situation 
is, that the fish-gate, which is next mentioned in Nehemiah, 

* Thornae Godwini Moses et Aaron, &c. illustrati, emendati et praecipuis 
thematibus aucti, studio Joh. Henr. Hottingeri, p. 392, et seq. 2d edit. 
Francof. ad Maenum, 1716. 



( HAP. IIT.] 



THE POOL OF BETHESDA. 



385 



is placed by most on the west, with great probability, saith 
Hottinger, because large quantities of fish were brought into 
the city from that quarter ; and because this situation seems 
to be assigned it in the following passage of the Second Book 
of Chronicles : " Now Manasseh built a wall without the city 
of David, on the west side of Gihon, in the valley, even to the 
entering in at the fish-gate." Thus, beginning at the south- 
west, he proceeds to the w r est, and so by the north, quite 
round the city ; assigning the several gates their situation, 
according to the order in which they are mentioned in the 
sacred history. 

Spanheim places the sheep-gate on the east,* Lightfoot on 
the south yf and in this, and several other respects, the topo- 
graphy of Jerusalem is a matter of great uncertainty. 

Godwin informs us, that near the sheep-gate was situated 
the pool of Bethesda ; ettl rrj irpofiaTiKr), saith the evangelist 
John, where our translators take the word ayopa to be under- 
stood, and accordingly have rendered it " by the sheep-mar- 
ket;" others, with Godwin, supply the noun irv\r}, and render 
it e f the sheep-gate which is the more probable sense, re- 
ferring to the gate mentioned under this name by Nehemiah. 
And if this gate was situated near the temple, as is most 
commonly supposed, perhaps it was so called because the 
sheep and other cattle for sacrifice were usually drove in 
through it. 

This pool of Bethesda demands our particular attention, on 
account of the miraculous cures which are ascribed to it in 
the Gospel of St. John, chap. v. 2 — 4. It is there called 
Ko\vfjifir)%pa ; a word, which, though it be rendered piscina by 
Beza and the Vulgate, yet does not properly signify a fish- 
pond, but rather a bath or pool for swimming, from KoAu/^Baw, 
nato. The Syriac therefore renders it, according to the Poly- 
glot translation, locus baptisterii. Its proper name in the 
Hebrew or Syriac language was Bethesda ; which Bochart,± 
Gomarus, and some others, derive from n s 2 beth, domus vel 

* Spanheim. Hierosol. Veteris Topograph. Descrip. p. 50, Oper. Geo- 
graphy &c. Lugd. Bat. 1701. 

f Lightfoot's Harmony on John v. 2. 

X Bochart. Geograph, lib. i, cap. xxxiv., Oper. torn. i. p. 614, edit. Lugd. 
Bat. 1707. 

2 c 



386 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book H. 



locus, and f&k ashadh, effudit. So that, according to this 
etymology, Bi^eo-Sci est locus effusiouis ; that is, as they con- 
ceive, either a reservoir for rain water, or a kind of cesspool, 
that received the waste water which run from the temple. 
Wagenseil* produces a passage from the Talmud, concerning 
a small stream issuing from the sanctuary, and proceeding to. 
the gate of the city of David, by which time it was become 
so considerable, that persons in particular cases, especially 
women, used to bathe in it. And as he supposes the water 
daily used in the temple service, in washing the hands and 
feet of the priests, the victims, vessels, &c, was somewhere or 
other collected into a reservoir; if that was called the pool of 
Bethesda, he professes he should incline to explain the word 
by effusiouis domus. But, on the whole, he declares himself 
uncertain. 

Others, with greater probability, derive the word from n>n 
beth, domus, and the Syriac NY#n chesdo, gratia vel miseri- 
cordia; and so the name signifies the house or place of mercy, 
because of the miraculous healing virtue with which God mer- 
cifully endowed the water of that pool; and this is indeed the 
most extraordinary thing to be observed concerning it. 

The evangelist says, that " an angel went down at a certain 
season into the pool, and troubled the water; whosoever then, 
first after the troubling the water, stepped in, was made whole 
of whatever disease he had ;" and, therefore, there lay at this 
pool, in the five porticos that surrounded it (of which we have 
already taken some notice), f< a multitude of impotent folk, as 
blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water." 
Now it is disputed, whether the virtue of these waters, and 
the cures performed by them, were miraculous or natural. 
Dr. Hammond contends for the latter, and imagines that the 
healing virtue of this bath was owing to the warm entrails of 
the victims being washed in it : that the angel, who is said to 
come and trouble the water, was only a messenger sent by 
the high-priest to stir up the bath, in order to mix the con- 
gealed blood, and other grosser particles that were sunk to the 
bottom, with the water, that so they might infuse their virtue 
into it more strongly. By Kara xaipov, which we render " at 
a certain season," he understands at a set time, that is, at 
* Sotah, cap. i. sect, xlvii, annot, iv. p. 308. 



( II A P. III.] 



THE POOL OF BETH ESI) A. 



387 



one of the great feasts, when a vast multitude of sacrifices 
were killed and offered, and by that means the waters of this 
pool were impregnated with more healing virtue than they 
would have at other times. But this sense of the passage, in 
which Dr. Hammond thinks himself countenanced by the au- 
thority of Theophylact,* appears improbable from almost all 
the circumstances of the story .f As, 

1st. From the healing virtue of this water extending to the 
cure of all manner of diseases. For it is said, " he that 
stepped in was made whole of whatever disease he had. : ' 
Dr. Hammond indeed supposes, that *' whatever disease he 
had," refers only to the three sorts of diseased persons before 
mentioned, namely, " the blind, lame, and withered." But 
that will not remove the objection, since no such healing virtue 
could ever be communicated to any other water by the same 
means, by washing the warm entrails of beasts in it, so as to 
render it effectual for the cure of all these diseases, or indeed 
of any one of them. 

2dly. It is highly improbable, that the troubling or stirring 
up the water should increase its healing virtue ; but rather, the 
stirring up the blood and faeces, that were sunk to the bottom, 
must make the bath so foul and fetid, that it would be more 
likely to poison than cure. 

* An attentive reader of Theophylact's Commentary in loc. will easily 
perceive, that Dr. Hammond hath mistaken his meaning; for Theophylact 
never intended to assert that these miraculous cures were owing to the 
washing the entrails of the beasts slain for sacrifice in the waters of this 
pool, which thereby acquired, in a natural way, a sanative virtue. All he 
saith is, that by this washing the water was sanctified, and become thereby 
the more fit (for what? for healing diseases by any natural quality hereby 
imparted to it ? no ; but) for receiving Svvafiiv Stiortpav, a divine power, by 
the operation of the angel, who came to it, not as to common water, but 
as to chosen water, vdan wg €/c\6ktw, and wrought the miracle, Sav/Aarovp- 
yuv. He says expressly, that the water did not heal by any virtue in itself, 
otherwise these cures would have been constant and perpetual ; but solely 
through the energy, tvtpytia, of the angel, who imparted to it its healing- 
virtue. 

f See also an attempt to account for the virtue of these waters in a simi- 
lar manner, from natural causes, in a tract published by Bartholine, a 
learned foreign physician, entitled, Paralytici Novi Testamenti medico et 
philologico Commentario illustrati ; and republished in Crenius's Fasciculus 
Quintus, vid. p. 313—333, and p. 390—411. 

2 c 2 



388 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK Hi 



3dly. No good reason can be given, on this supposition, 
why these medicinal waters should not have cured many per- 
sons as well as one only, the first that stepped in. The Doc- 
tor is indeed aware of this objection, and endeavours to evade 
it by supposing the bath might be so small, that it would hold 
but one at a time, and by the time one was cured, the healing 
particles were subsided, and therefore it could not heal an- 
other. But then, why could it not be stirred up a second 
time, and a third, and as many as there were persons to be 
cured ? However, 

4thly. The whole foundation of this supposition appears to 
be a mistake ; namely, that the entrails of the victims were 
washed in this pool out of the temple ; for Dr. Lightfoot 
shows that it was done in the temple, in the washing-room, as 
it was called, appointed for that purpose.* And, indeed, if 
this pool was near the sheep-gate, and if we suppose Hottin- 
ger's, or even Lightfoot's account of the situation of that gate 
to be true, it was then at too great a distance from the temple 
to be used as a washing-place for the entrails of the beasts 
slain for sacrifice. 

Upon the whole, therefore, there is reason to conclude, that 
the healing virtue of this pool was miraculous; that the angel 
Was a heavenly angel ; and that the design and use of his 
coming was either to work the miracle, as God's instrument, 
by the use of the water ; or, at least, by troubling the water, 
and giving it some unusual motion, to give notice to those 
who were waiting for a cure, when they might seek it. 

It is farther inquired, when this miraculous pool first re- 
ceived its healing virtue ? I take the most probable opinion 
to be, that it was about the time of, or not long before, our 
Saviour's coming ; and very likely the chief intent of the 
miracle might be to give notice, by an illustrious type, of the 
speedy accomplishment of Zechariah's prophecy : " In that 
day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David, 
and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for unclean- 
ness;" chap. xiii. 1. Thus the fountain of the blood of Christ 
to take away all sin, was afresh typified by the miraculous 

* See Dr. Lightfoot's Description of the Temple, chap. xxxi. ; and he 
supposes (Hot. Heb. John v. 2), that the pool of Bethesda was a bath, 
Ko\vfi(3r)0pa, in which those who were unclean purified themselves. 



CHAP. III.] THE GATES OF THE TEMPLE. 



389 



virtue which God put into this pool to heal all manner of 
diseases. And as the fountain of Christ's blood was to be 
opened at the passover, at which feast he was crucified, so 
Dr. Lig-htfoot imagines, that the miraculous cure was effected 
by this pool at that feast only.* 

It may seem a little strange, that there is no mention made 
of this miracle, either by Josephus, or the writers of the Tal- 
mud, who on all other occasions are ready enough to celebrate 
the miracles which God wrought for, and which did honour 
to, their nation. But supposing, which is highly probable, 
that the miraculous virtue was first imparted to this pool 
about the time of our Saviour's coming, and that it ceased at 
his death, whereby it plainly appeared that this miracle was 
wrought in honour of Christ, we need not wonder that Josephus 
passes it over in silence, since he could not relate it without 
reviving a testimony to Christ, greatly to the discredit of his 
own nation, who rejected and crucified him. And as it is not 
recorded by Josephus, it is not unlikely, that the memory of it 
was lost among the Jews at the time when the Talmud was 
written, which was not till several hundred years afterward, f 

Concerning the gates of the temple, Godwin observes, that 
there were two of principal note, both built by Solomon ; the 
one for those that were new married, the other for mourners 
and excommunicated persons. The mourners, he saith, were 
distinguished from the excommunicated by having their lips 
covered with a skirt of their garment ; none entered that gate 
with their lips uncovered but such as were excommunicated. 
The Mishna saith, " All that enter, according to the custom 
of the temple, go in on the right-hand way, go round, and go 
out on the left-hand way ; except a person, cui accidit aliquid, 
who is rendered unclean by a particular circumstance, who 
goes round and enters on the left. And being asked why he 
does so, if he answer, Because I mourn, they reply, He who 
inhabits this house comfort thee. If he answer, Because I 

* Horse Hebraic. John v. 4. 

f There are two very learned dissertations on this subject in the second 
volume of the Thesaurus Novus Theologico Philologicus : one by Joan. 
Conrad. Hottingerus de Piscina Bethesda ; the other by David Ebersbach, 
de Miraculo Piscina? Bethesdse. The last contains a full reply both to Bar- 
tholine and Hammond. See also Witsii Miscell. torn. ii. exercitat. xi. sect, 
liv.— lx. p. 314—320. 



390 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[COOK 11. 



am excommunicated, the reply is, according to R. Jose, He 
who inhabits this house put it into thy heart to hearken to 
the words of thy companions, or brethren, that they may re- 
ceive thee." # It appears from hence (at least according to 
the opinion of the mishnical rabbies), that excommunicated 
persons were not excluded from the temple, though they were 
from the synagogue, as we learn from several passages in the 
evangelist John, chap. ix. 22; xii. 42; xvi. 2; where such 
persons are said to be cnroawayuyoi, excluded from the syna- 
gogue. Not that we are to infer from this, that the Jews 
accounted their synagogues more holy than the temple ; but 
it shows what was, and should be, the true intent of excom- 
munication, namely, the shaming and humbling an offender, 
in order to bring him to repentance ; on which account he was 
excluded the society of his neighbours in the synagogue ; but 
not his eternal destruction, by driving him from tiic presence 
of God in the temple, and depriving him of ihe use of the 
most solemn ordinances, and the most effectual means of 
grace and salvation. The temple was the common place of 
worship for Israelites ; by allowing him to come thither they 
signified, that they did not exclude him from the common 
privilege of an Israelite, though they would not receive him 
into their familiarity and friendship. How much heavier is 
the yoke of antichrist than the Jewish yoke of bondage ! 
How much more cruel is the excommunication of Popery, 
which deprives persons of ail their liberties and privileges, of 
their goods and lives, and consigns over their souls to be tor- 
mented in hell for ever, — how infinitely more cruel, I say, 
is this modern excommunication than even that of the wicked 
and barbarous Jews, who crucified the Lord of glory ! 

* Mish. tit. Middoth. cap. ii. sect, ii.; et Maimon. in loc. torn. v. p. 334, 
335, edit, Surenhus.; Lightf. Hor. Hebr. 1 Cor. v. 5. 



CHAPTER IV. 



OF THEIR GROVES AND HIGH PLACES. 

We have several times had occasion to observe, that in order 
the more effectually to guard the Israelites from idolatry, the 
blessed God, in instituting the rites of his own worship, went 
directly counter to the practice of the idolatrous nations. 
Thus, because they worshipped in groves, # he expressly for- 
bad "the planting a grove of trees near his altar;" Deut. xvi. 
21.+ Nor would he suffer his people to offer their sacrifices 
on the tops of hills and mountains, as the heathens did J but 
ordered that they should be brought to one altar in the place 
which he appointed ; Deut. xii. 13, 14. And as for the groves, 

* Haec (nemora sc.) fuere numinum templa, priscoque ritu simplicia rura 
Deo prsecellentem arborem dicant. Nec magis auro fulgentia atque ebore 
simulacra quam lucos et ipsa silentia adoramus. Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xii. 
cap. i. p. 4, torn. iii. edit. Harduin. 1685. See also Lucian. de Sacrif. torn, 
i. p. 355, C, D, edit. Salmur. 1619. These groves Plutarch calls aXatjBewv, 
the groves of the gods, which he saith. Numa frequented, and thereby gave 
occasion to the story of his commerce with the goddess Egeria ; Plutarc. in 
Numa, p. 61, F, Oper. torn. i. edit. Francof. 1620. They are expressly en- 
joined, by the laws of the twelve tables, as a part of the public religion, Lucos 
in agris habento. Vid. Duodecim. Tabular. Fragm. tit. Ubi colendi ad cal- 
cem Cod. Justiniani, p. 751, apud Corp. Juris Civil, edit. Lips. 1720. 

f See Spencer's learned dissertation on this and the following verse, de 
Leg. Hebrseor. lib. ii. cap. xxvii. xxviii. 

% Sophocles introduces Hercules asking Hyllus, whether he knew Mount 
(Eta, which was sacred to Jupiter? "Yes," saith he, "fori have often 
sacrificed upon the top of it." Trachin. v. 1207, 1208, torn. ii. p. 325 7 edit. 
Glasg. 1745. And Strabo sailh of the Persians, ayaXnara kcci (Su^ovg ovk 
t dpvovrai, Svovcrt ev v-ipi]\u) tottu) rov ovpapov rj-yov/xsvoi Aia; Geograph. 
lib. xv. p. 732, C, edit. Casaub. 1620. See also Herodot. Clio, cap. cxxxi. 
p. 55, sect. 131, edit. Gronov.; Xenophon. Cyr. lib. viii. p. 500, 3d edit. 
Hutchins; and Appian(deBelloMithrad. p. 361, 362, sect, ccxv., edit. Tollii, 
Amstel. 1670) saith, that Mithridates sacrificed to Jupiter according to the 
custom of his country, e-rn opovg u^\ov, upon a high mountain. 



392 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II 



which the Canaanites had planted, and the idols and altars 
which they had erected on the tops of high mountains and 
hills for the worship of their gods, the Israelites are com- 
manded utterly to destroy them; ver. 2, 3. 

The groves and high places do not seem to have been dif- 
ferent, but the same places, or groves planted on the tops of 
hills, probably round an open area, in which the idolatrous 
worship was performed, as may be inferred from the following 
words of the prophet Hosea : " They sacrifice upon the tops of 
mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under oaks, and 
poplars, and elms chap. iv. 13. The use of groves for reli- 
gious worship is generally supposed to have been as ancient 
as the patriarchal ages ; for we are informed, that " Abraham 
planted a grove in Beersheba, and called there on the name of 
the Lord Gen.xxi. 33. However, it is not expressly said, 
nor can it by this passage be proved, that he planted the grove 
for any religious purpose; it might only be designed to shade 
his tent. And this circumstance perhaps is recorded to inti- 
mate his rural way of living, as well as his religious character ; 
that he dwelt in a tent, under the shade of a grove, or tree, as 
the word b\VH eshel, may more properly be translated ; and in 
this humble habitation led a very pious and devout life. 

The reason and origin of planting sacred groves is variously 
conjectured; some imagining it was only hereby intended to 
render the service more agreeable to the worshippers, by the 
pleasantness of the shade ;■* whereas others suppose it was to 
invite the presence of the gods. The one or the other of these 
reasons seems to be intimated in the forecited passage of 
Hosea, " They burn incense under oaks, and poplars, and 
elms, because the shade thereof is good;" chap. iv. 13. Others 
conceive their worship was performed in the midst of groves, 
because the gloom of such a place is apt to strike a religious 
awe upon the mind ;f or else, because such dark conceal- 

* This seems, according to Virgil, to have been the reason of Dido's build- 
ing the temple of Juno in a delightful grove : 

Lucus in urbe fuit media, laetissimus umbra : 
Hie templum Junoni ingens Sidonia Dido 
Condebat. iEneid, lib. i. v. 44.5. 

f " Si tibi occurrit," saith Seneca, Epist. xli. " vetustis arboribus, et 
solitam altitudinem egressis frequens lucus, et conspectum coeli densitate 



CHAP . IV.] GROVES AND HIGH PLACES. 



393 



Hients suited the lewd mysteries of their idolatrous wor- 
ship.* 

I have met with another conjecture, which seems as pro- 
bable as any, that this practice began with the worship of 
demons, or departed souls. It was an ancient custom to bury 
the dead under trees, or in woods. " Deborah was buried 
under an oak, near Bethel," Gen. xxxv. 8; and the bones of 
Saul and Jonathan under a tree at Jabesh; 1 Sam. xxxi. 13. 
Now an imagination prevailing among the heathen, that the 
souls of the deceased hover about their graves, or at least de- 
light to visit their dead bodies, the idolaters, who paid divine 
honours to the souls of their departed heroes, erected images 
and altars for their worship in the same groves where they 
were buried ;f and from thence it grew into a custom after- 
ward to plant groves, and build temples, near the tombs of 
departed heroes, 2 Kings xxiii. 15, 16; J and to surround 
their temples and altars with groves and trees ;§ and these 

ramorum aliorum alios protegentium submovens: ilia proceritas sylvae, et 
secretum loci et admiratio umbra?, in aperto tam densce atque continuse, 
fidem tibi numinis facit. Et siquis specus saxis penitus exesis montem sus- 
penderit, non raanufactus, sed naturalibus causis in tantam laxitatem exca- 
vatus : animum tuum quadam religionis suspicione percutiet." See also a 
remarkable passage in Virgil, jEneid, viii. v. 347, et seq. 

* For proof of the lewdness and obscenity of many of the religious rites 
of the heathen, vid. Herodot. Euterp. cap. lxiv. p. 112, 113, edit. Gronov. 
et Clio, sect, cxcix. p. 80; Diodor. Sicul. lib. iv. init. ; Valer. Maxim, 
lib. ii. cap. vi. sect. xv. p. 185, 186, edit. Thysii. Lugd. Bat. 1655; Juve- 
nal, sat. ix. v. 24 ; and what Eusebius saith of a grove on Mount Libanus, 
dedicated to Venus, in his Life of Constantine, lib. iii. cap. lv. Compare 
1 Kings xiv. 23, 24. 

f Plato, after having declared his approbation of the sentiment of He- 
siod, that when any of the golden age died they became demons, and the 
authors of great good to mankind ; and after having asserted, that all who 
died bravely in war were entitled to be ranked in the same class, reckons, 
among the honours they deserved, their sepulchres being esteemed and 
worshipped as the repositories of demons — wg daifiovov ovtio Oepairtvaonev 
ts Kai TrpoffKWT](yo[iev avrw rag OijKag. De Republ. lib. v. p. 662, D, E, 
edit. Ficin. Francofurt. 1602. 

X See Arrian's description of the tomb of Cyrus, de Expedit. Alexandr. 
lib. vi. p. 435, edit. Blancard. Amstel. 1678. 

§ On account of the custom of planting trees near temples, " the poets," 
as Strabo informs us, " styled all their temples groves, even those which had 
no plantations around them." Geograph. lib. ix. p. 412, D, edit. Casaub, 
1620. 



394 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK J I . 



sacred groves being constantly furnished with the images of 
the heroes or gods that were worshipped in them, a grove 
and an idol came to be used as convertible terms; 2 Kings 
xxiii. 6. 

We have before observed, that these sacred groves were 
usually planted on the tops of hills or mountains, from whence 
they are called in Scripture bamoth, or " high places." 

Perhaps such an exalted situation was chosen by idolaters, 
in respect to their chief god, the sun, whom they worshipped, 
together with their inferior deities, on the tops of hills and 
mountains, that they might approach as near to him as they 
could. * It is no improbable conjecture concerning the Egyp- 
tian pyramids, that they were intended as altars to the sun, 
as well as very likely for sepulchral monuments, like these 
ancient groves. Accordingly, they are all flat at the top, to 
serve the purposes of an altar. It is said, that altars to the 
sun, of the same form, though not so large as the pyramids, 
were found among the American idolaters .f 

There might be another reason for planting the sacred 
groves on the tops of hills and mountains ; namely, for the 
sake of retirement from noise and disturbance in their acts 
of worship. i And on this account, probably, the worshippers 
of the true God had also their proseuchse, or places of retire- 
mentfor worship, generally on hills or high places. Accordingly 
we read, that Christ " went up into a mountain apart to pray;" 
Matt. xiv. 23. And at his transfiguration he retired with 
three of his " disciples, to the top of a high mountain apart ;" 
chap. xvii. 1. I see no reason, therefore, to conclude, that 
those high places, of which we read in the Old Testament, 
where holy men and worshippers of the true God paid their 
devotion, were the sacred groves of the idolaters, but rather 
they were Jewish proseuchse, or synagogues. Such were the 
high places by the city where Samuel lived, and where he 
sacrificed with the people, 1 Sam. ix. 12 — 14; and upon the 

* Tacitus speaks of some places, which were thought " maxime coelo pro- 
pinquare, precesque mortalium a Deo nusquam proprius audiri." Annal. 
lib. xiii. sect. lvii. p. 281, edit. Glasg. 1743. 

f See Young's Historical Dissertation on Idolatrous Corruptions in Re- 
ligion, vol. i. p. 222—228. 

X " Lucos et ipsa silentia adoramus," saith Pliny, in a passage before 
cited. 



CHAP. IV.] GROVES AND HIGH PLACES. 



395 



hill of Gath, where was either a school of the prophets, or they 
had been thither to pay their devotion when Saul met them ; 
see 1 Sam. x. 5 — 13. And of the same sort was the great 
high place at Gibeon, where Solomon sacrificed, and where 
God appeared to him in a dream ; 1 Kings iii. 4, 5. 

The grand difficulty on this head is how to reconcile their 
sacrificing in other places beside the national altar, as Gideon 
did at Ophrah, Judges vi. 24; Manoah in the country of Dan, 
chap. xiii. 16 — 20; Samuel at Mizpah, 1 Sam. vii. 10, and 
at Bethlehem, chap. xvi. 5; David in the threshing-floor of 
Oman, 1 Chron. xxi. 22; and Elijah on Mount Carmel, 
1 Kings xviii. 30, et seq., — with the law in the book of Deu- 
teronomy, " Take heed to thyself, that thou offer not thy 
burnt-offerings in every place that thou seest. But in the 
place which the Lord thy God shall choose, there thou shalt 
offer thy burnt-offerings, and there thou shaft do all that I 
commanded thee;" chap. xii. 13, 14. 

The best solution, I apprehend, is, that it was done by 
special divine direction and command, God having an un- 
doubted right to supersede his own positive laws, when and 
in what cases he pleases ; and as this is expressly asserted to 
have been done in David's case before mentioned, 1 Chron. 
xxi. 18, it may the more reasonably be supposed in all the 
rest. 

This may intimate to us the true solution of another diffi- 
culty, how to reconcile the law which prescribes an altar " of 
earth only to be made in all places where God should record 
his name," Exod. xx. 24, with the order which Moses re- 
ceived to make a brazen altar in the court of the tabernacle. 

Some have supposed, that the brazen altar was filled with 
earth and stones, and so was an altar of earth, though cased 
with brass. But the real solution I take to be this: " In all 
places wdiere I record my name," means, in whatever par- 
ticular place, beside the national altar, I shall cause my name 
to be recorded, by commanding my servants to sacrifice unto 
me, there thou shalt make an altar of earth. 

The reason of God's appointing such plain and inartificial 
altars, on these special occasions, was in all likelihood to pre- 
vent that superstitious veneration which the people would pro- 
bably have entertained for them, as having a more than ordi- 



396 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK II. 



nary sanctity in them, if they had been more expensive and 
durable ; whereas being raised just to serve a present exigence, 
and presently pulled down, or falling of themselves, they could 
not administer any temptation to superstition or idolatry. 

But to return: Though some places were called by the 
name of high places, which had never been polluted with 
heathen idolatry, and in which God was acceptably wor- 
shipped, nevertheless, all which had been actually so defiled 
the Israelites are commanded utterly to destroy; insomuch, 
that it is left upon record, as a stain and blemish upon the 
character of some of the more pious kings of Judah, that they 
did not destroy them, but suffered the people, who were very 
prone to idolatry, to sacrifice in them : which is the case of 
Asa, 1 Kings xv 14; Jehoshaphat, chap.xxii.43; and several 
others. 



CHAPTER V. 



OF THE CITIES OF REFUGE. 

The Latin word asylum, used for a sanctuary, or place of 
refuge, has so near an affinity with the Hebrew word b\VX eshel, 
a tree or grove, as to make it probable, that the sacred groves, 
which we spoke of in the last chapter, were the ancient places 
of refuge, and that the Romans derived the use of them from 
the eastern nations. So we find in Virgil, that the asyla were 
groves : # 

Hinc lucum ingentera quem Romulus acer asylum 

Rettulit. JEneid, viii. 1. 342. 

And God's altar appears to have been the asylum of the Jews, 
before the cities of refuge were appointed ; Exod. xxi. 14. 
Some persons have imagined, that all the cities of the Levites, 
in number forty-two, were asyla. But that appears to be a 
mistake ; for in the book of Numbers, chap. xxxv. 6, among 
the cities that were given to the Levites, only six are men- 
tioned as appointed to be cities of refuge. 

These asyla were not only intended for Jews, but for Gen- 
tiles, or for strangers, who dwelt among them ; ver. 15. 

They were not designed as sanctuaries for wilful murderers, 

* Mr. Jones supposes, that the reason why these groves were considered 
as places of refuge, was the opinion which prevailed, that the demons, to 
whom they were dedicated, afforded their assistance to those who fled to 
them for protection. " Asylorum origo mihi deducenda videtur ex antiquorum 
erga mortuos reverentia, et opinione eorum potential opem ferendi supplici- 
bus. Illi, qui a potentioribus metuebant, ad sepulcra virorum eximiorum 
confugiebant." Vid. Senecam in Troad. act iii. Ita Plutarchus Thesei se- 
pulcrum fuisse asylum dicit in vita Thesei, sub fm. He observes, that God 
never appointed his altar for an asylum; nevertheless, it was so considered 
before the giving of the law in Exodus concerning the cities of refuge. On 
which account he imagines, that the origin of asyla was not a divine insti- 
tution, but that God, by his appointment of cities of refuge, perhaps in- 
tended to check and restrain the superstitious and idolatrous use of groves 
and altars for this purpose. Annot. MS. in Godwini Mos. et Aaron. 



308 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1 J . 



and all kinds of atrocious villains among the Jews, as they 
were among the Greeks and Romans,* and now are in 
Roman Catholic countries,*!" but merely for securing those 
who had been guilty of involuntary homicide, Deut. xix. 4 — 10, 
from the effects of private revenge, until they were cleared by 
a legal process. And it is observable, that the Israelites are 
commanded to " prepare the way," that is, to make the road 
good, " that every slayer may flee thither" without impedi- 
ment, and with all expedition; ver. 3. And, as Godwin ob- 
serves, the rabbies inform us, among other circumstances, that 
at every cross road was set up an inscription, Asylum ! Asylum ! 
Upon which Hottinger remarks, that it was probably in allu- 
sion to this custom that John the Baptist is described as "the 
voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of 
the Lord, make his paths straight;" Luke iii. 4 — 6. He was 
the Messiah's forerunner, and in that character was to remove 
the obstacles to men's flying to him as their asylum, and ob- 
taining, GWTripiov tov Qeov, the salvation of God. 

For any thing farther on this subject w r e refer to Godwin's 
Moses and Aaron, especially with Hottinger's notes. 

* Privilegia asylorum, inquit Jonesius, summa erant, certa enira in illis 
supplicibus salus, nec ullus inde sub quovis praetextu ad paenum extra- 
hendus, dadoHcaai yap ce aveiav tvravSa iictTevovcn. Pausan. lib. ii. p. 108, 
1. 45, edit. Xyland. Hanov. 1613. Nec de eo qui in asylum confugerat, judi- 
cium instituebant, nec examinabant, an talis vitae dignus erat, an non. Eum 
verb Diis relinquendum censebant. Ita Leotycidam, quamvis proditionis 
reum, nunquam extrahere conati sunt Laced cemonii. Pausan. lib. iii. p. 171, 
1. 44, et seq. Ita Livius, lib. xliv. cap. xxix. Sanctitas templi insulseque 
inviolatos prceestabat omnes. Et idem de cujuslibet generis maleficis, quin- 
etiam obseratis, testatur Tacitus ; Annal. lib. iii. cap. lx. Verum est quod 
aliqui aliquando hsec viokirunt privilegia; sed ii habebantur hominum 
scelestissimi, nec a paena ab hominibus erant liberi, nisi nimia eos tuebatur 
potentia. Vid. Thucyd. lib. i. sect, cxxvi. p. 69, 70, et sect, cxxxiv. p. 174, 
175, edit. Hudson. Saltern vero violatorum horum privilegiorum acerrimi, 
vindices habebantur Dii. Vid. Justin, lib. viii. cap. i. ii. ; Pausan. lib. i. 
p. 36, 1. 20, et seq.; et lib. vii. p. 445, I. 50, et seq. p. 447, L 37, edit. 
Xyland. Hanov. 1613. 

f Middleton's Letter from Rome, p. 156—158, of his Miscellan. Works, 
vol. v. octavo. 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



BOOK III. 



CONCERNING TIMES. 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



CHAPTER I. 

OF DAYS, HOURS, WEEKS, AND YEARS. 

Th e Hebrews, in common with other nations, distinguished 
their days into natural, consisting of twenty-four hours ; and 
artificial, that is, from sun-rise to sun-set. 

Concerning the natural day, it is inquired when it began 
and ended. 

Godwin conceives the ancient Jews had two different be- 
ginnings of the natural day; one of the sacred or festival day, 
which was in the evening ; the other of the civil or working 
day, which was in the morning. That the sacred day began 
in the evening is certain from the following passage of Levi- 
ticus : " From even unto even shall ye celebrate your sab- 
baths," chap, xxiii. 32; and also from the following words in 
the book of Exodus : " In the first month , on the fourteenth 
day of the month at even, ye shall eat unleavened bread, until 
the one and twentieth day of the month at even ;" chap. xii. 
18. Nevertheless, the passage which our author alleges out 
of the evangelist Matthew, " In the end of the sabbath, as it 
began to dawn toward the first day of the week/' chap, xxviii. 
1, does not so certainly prove, that the civil, natural day be- 
gan in the morning. For " the first day of the week " may 
there be understood of the artificial day ; as indeed the word 
zTritywGKovai)* seems to imply. In like manner, though we 
begin the natural day at midnight, yet we speak of the day 
breaking or dawning a little before sun-rise. That the Jews 
began the day, not at evening, but at midnight, or in the 
morning, at the time of their migration out of Egypt, appears 

* See on this word Dr. Macknight's Commentary in loc. 
2 D 



402 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK [II. 



from hence, that the fifteenth day of the month, in which they 
departed from Egypt, is said to be the morrow after the pass- 
over, which was kept on the fourteenth day in the evening ; 
Numb, xxxiii. 3, compared with Exod. xii. 6. But neither 
will this prove, that they reckoned the beginning of their 
civil and sacred day from a different epocha. It is more 
probable, that, before their departure out of Egypt, they be- 
gan all their days, both civil and sacred, with the sun's rising, 
as the ancient Babylonians, Persians, Syrians, and most of 
the eastern nations did.* And, at the time of their migration, 
God ordered them to change the beginning, not only of the 
year and of the week, but likewise of the day, from the morn- 
ing to the evening, in opposition to the customs of the idola- 
trous nations, who, in honour to their chief god, the sun, be- 
gan their day at his rising. 

Cocceius, who supposes, that only the sacred day began in 
the evening, finds out this mystery in it, that God appointed 
the sabbath of the Jewish church to begin with the night, in 
order to signify the darkness of that dispensation, compared 
with the subsequent one of the gospel; the light of divine 
knowledge being in those times like that of the moon and 
stars in the night, but under the Christian dispensation, like 
that of the sun in the day.f 

It has been commonly supposed, that the epocha, or be- 
ginning, of the natural day was originally in the evening ; 
" The evening and the morning/' saith Moses in the book of 
Genesis, ■* were the first day;" chap. i. 5. And if so, we are 
to conclude, that the idolaters had changed the beginning of 
the day to the morning, in honour of the sun ; and that God 
restored it, by the law which he gave to the Jews, to its 
original epocha. But learned men are not agreed about the 
meaning of this passage, and the reason of Moses's setting 
the evening before the morning. Le Clerc % begins the first 
day from the creation of the chaos, and by the evening he 
understands all the time it remained in darkness, before the 
production of light. But this opinion does not well agree 
with the import of the Hebrew word 1")$ gnerebh, the evening, 

* Petav. de Doctrina Temporum, lib. vii. p. 609. 

f Vid. Cocceii Comment, in Lev. xxiii. sect, xviii. Oper. torn. i. p. 173. 
X In loc. 



CHAP, I.] 



DAYS. 



403 



from gnarabh, mkcuit ; which therefore denotes twilight, 
in which there is a kind of mixture of light and darkness ; 
rather than total darkness, such as there was before light was 
produced. 

Others think it more natural to date the beginning of 
time, and the succession of day and night, from the first pro- 
duction of light. But as for the reason of Moses's setting the 
evening before the morning, the most probable opinions are 
those of Cocceius and Lyra. Cocceius understands the words 
in the following manner, that the light moved away from the 
place or hemisphere, on which it first appeared, and was suc- 
ceeded by darkness ; and when it returned to enlighten the 
same hemisphere again, the first day was completed. # So 
that, according to him, the evening signifies the light moving 
away, which it began to do from its first appearance. 

The other opinion is, that the two parts of the natural day, 
namely, the artificial day and artificial night, are denominated 
from the terms which complete them, from the evening, which 
is the end of the day, and from the morning, which is the end 
of the night ; and so the evening and the morning make up 
one natural day ; namely, from morning to morning .f 

But whatever were the reasons of Moses's setting the even- 
ing before the morning, or the night before the day, his ex- 
pression has plainly been followed by other writers, and in 
other languages. Hence days are expressed in the book of 
Daniel by ^pl-l"iy gnerebh-boker , evening and morning; 
chap. viii. 14. Hence also is the use of the Greek word 
wydnpzpov ; 2 Cor. xi. 25. And may we not observe some 
faint traces of the same original in the English language, in 
our computing time by nights rather than by days ; as, in 
the words sennight, fortnight, 8cc. ? 

With respect to the artificial day and night, I observe, that 
the Hebrews divided the night into four watches, as appears 
from St. Matthew, who speaks of the fourth watch of the 
night, chap. xiv. 25 ; and from St. Mark, who styles these 
watches, the even, midnight, cockcrowing, and the morning; 
chap. xiii. 35. Nevertheless, it should seem that they an- 
ciently divided the night into an odd number of watches, pro- 

* Vid. Cocceii Cur. prior, in Gen. i. 5. 
f Vid. Lyr. apud Poli Synops. in loc. 

2 d 2 



404 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



bably into three ; since we read in the book of Judges, of 
" the middle watch ;" chap. vii. 19. 

It is probable these watches had their rise, and their name, 
from the watchmen who kept guard at the gates of the city 
and of the temple by night, and who relieved one another by 
turns. And if anciently there were but three watches, then 
each watched four hours ; and more in the winter, when the 
nights are above twelve long. But that being found too 
tedious and tiresome, the number of watches was afterward 
increased to four. We, therefore, never read of the middle 
watch in the New Testament. 

The day was divided into hours ; which are reckoned to be 
of two sorts, less and greater. The lesser hours were twelve, 
as appears from the following question in the evangelist John, 
"Are there not twelve hours in the day V chap. xi. 9. Each 
of these was a twelfth part of the artificial day. Herodotus 
observes, that the Greeks learned from the Babylonians, 
among other things, the method of dividing the day into 
twelve parts. But whether the Hebrews derived it from the 
Babylonians, or the Babylonians from the Hebrews, cannot 
now be known. * Nor does it appear how ancient this di- 
vision of the day into hours, among the Hebrews, was. The 
first hint in Scripture, which seems to imply such a division, 
is a passage in the Second Book of Kings, chap. xx. 9 — 11, 
where we read of the shadow's going back twenty degrees on 
the sun-dial of Ahaz. But the history gives us no intimation 
what those degrees were, or what portion of time was marked 
by them. 

The mention of this dial suggests a question which has oc- 
casioned much dispute among the learned : Whether the mi- 
racle of the shadow's going back was wrought upon the sun, 
or only upon the dial? Vatablus, Montanus, and several 
moderns observe, that there is not a word said of the sun's 
going back, but only of the shadow upon the dial ; which 
might be effected by the divine power, perhaps by the ministry 
of angels, obstructing or refracting the rays of the sun, or 
altering the position of the dial, so as to make the shadow 
retire without changing the motion of the sun itself. The 

* Herodot. Euterp. cap. cix. p. 127, editGronov. • 



CHAP. I.J 



HOURS. 



405 



Jews, in general, are of the contrary opinion, with which Arch- 
bishop Usher agrees ; who says, that the sun and all the hea- 
venly bodies went back, and as much was detracted from the 
next night as was added to this day.* 

The arguments on this side of the question are, 
1st. The words of Isaiah, chap, xxxviii. 8, that " the sun 
returned ten degrees." But this may possibly be meant only 
of its shadow, especially in so poetical a writer as Isaiah. 

2dly. That the miracle was observed at Babylon, from 
whence Meradach-Baladan sent to inquire about it, 2 Chron. 
xxxii. 31 ; which could not have been the case, unless it 
had been wrought on the sun itself, and not merely on the 
dial of Ahaz. To this it is answered, that it does not appear 
the miracle was observed at Babylon; rather the contrary. 
For it is said, " The princes of Babylon sent to inquire of 
the wonder that was done in the land;" not as a thing they 
themselves had seen in their own country, which must have 
been the case, if the miracle had been wrought on the sun ; 
but which they had heard reported as done in the land of 
Israel, f 

To return to our subject: the first mention we have of 
hours in the Old Testament is in the book of Daniel, parti- 
cularly in the fourth chapter; where Daniel, upon hearing 
Nebuchadnezzar's dream, is said to have been astonished for 
one hour, ver. 19, nyttf shangnah. But that word is of too 
general a signification to prove that hours, in the modern 
sense of the term, were then in use ; it seems rather to import 
any portion of time; and perhaps, in the decree of Nebu- 
chadnezzar, that all who refused to worship his image should 
be cast into the fiery furnace, it might as well be rendered 
that minute or moment, as " the same hour;" chap. iii. 15. 
And, in the present case, it is not very likely, that a poor Jewish 
slave, as Daniel was, should stand as one stupid, a whole 
hour, in the presence of so great a monarch as Nebuchad- 
nezzar. On the whole, I do not find that the antiquity of the 
Jewish hours can be traced and ascertained by any thing that 
is said in the Old Testament. 

* Usser. Annal. A. M. 4001. 
■ f Vossius de Origine et Progressu Idololatriae, lib. ii. cap. ix. p. 179, 
Amstel. 1668. 



406 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES 



[BOOK III. 



Besides the twelve lesser hours (which, as they are sup- 
posed to be equal divisions of the artificial day, must be of 
different lengths at different times of the year, and which are 
the same that we now call Jewish hours), Godwin, with many 
others, speaks of the greater hours ; which are said to be four, 
each containing three of the lesser hours ; the first beginning 
at sun-rise (and not at six o'clock, as Godwin erroneously 
says), and holding till about nine. The second ended at 
noon, the third in the middle of the afternoon, and the fourth 
at sun-set. However, this division of the day into greater 
hours is not sufficiently supported by the passages of Scripture 
which Godwin quotes in proof of it. And several learned 
men, very skilful in these matters, have doubted whether any 
such hours were in use amons: the Jews. 

o 

Mayer* thinks he has proved, that the greater hours were 
in use in the days of Nehemiah, from the following passage : 
" They read in the book of the law one fourth part of the day, 
and another fourth part they confessed and worshipped the 
Lord their God;" chap. ix. 3. This, however, will prove 
no more, than that they had skill enough, in those times, to 
divide the day, upon occasion, into four parts; but that these 
divisions were called the greater hours, or that this was a 
stated division of the day, does not appear. 

Since, then, the use of the greater hours is so uncertain, 
even in our Saviour's time, we must not rely on them, as 
Godwin does, for reconciling the different accounts of the 
evangelists, concerning the time of our Lord's crucifixion. 
St. Mark says it was at the third hour, chap. xv. 25; whereas, 
according to St. John, chap. xix. 14, it was about the sixth 
hour when he was arraigned before Pilate. Some endeavour 
to remove this difficulty by the supposition, that St. John's 
Gospel was written after the destruction of Jerusalem,f and 
that he therefore uses the computation of the Romans, who 
began the natural day, as we do, from twelve o'clock at night; 
accordingly the sixth hour, when Pilate condemned Christ to 

* Johannis Mayeri Tractat. de Temporibus et Festis Diebus Hebrseor. 
part i. cap. x. sect. xiv. — xvii. p. 68 — 70, 2d edit. Amstel. 1724. 

f That St. John's Gospel was written, not after, but before the destruc- 
tion of Jerusalem, see proved by Dr. Lardner, in his Supplement to the 
Second Part of his Credibility, vol. i. chap. ix. sect. ix. x. p. 391 — 445. 



CHAP. I.] 



HOURS. 



407 



be crucified, was six in the morning : but St. Mark uses the 
Jewish computation, according to which the third hour an- 
swers to our nine in the morning, at which time Christ was 
nailed to the cross. 

This is an ingenious way of reconciling the two evangelists ; 
and, provided it could be made appear that St. John uses the 
Roman computation in any other part of bis history, we should 
readily acquiesce in it. But, I apprehend, the contrary is 
very probable from the following passage in the fourth chap- 
ter, ver. & — 8 : " Jesus, therefore, being wearied with his 
journey, sat thus on the well ; and it was about the sixth 
hour. There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water ; 
Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. For his disciples 
were gone away into the city to buy meat." Now it is not 
so probable, that the disciples should be gone to procure pro- 
visions for their refreshment on their journey at six in the 
morning as at twelve at noon ; much less is it likely, that 
Christ was wearied with his journey at so early an hour; and 
if St. John uses the Jewish computation in this part of his 
history, it is hardly consistent with the character of a good 
historian to use the Roman in another part of it; at least, 
without giving notice of the change. Perhaps, therefore, an 
easier way of solving this difficulty is to admit the reading of 
the Cambridge manuscript, which has rpn-Tj, the third, instead 
of £kttj, the sixth hour, in the preceding passage. And this 
reading is confirmed by Nonnus's Paraphrase,* and by Peter 
of Alexandria, or whoever was the author of the fragment 
prefixed to the Chronicon Paschale ;f who expressly asserts, 
that it was Tpirr) in the original copy,J which, he saith, was at 
that time preserved with great care in the church of Ephe- 
sus.§ 

* See the passage in Dr. Lardner's Credibility, part ii. chap, cxxviii.vol. xi. 
p. 63. 

f Consult Cave, Hist. Literar. ad init. sect. iv. 

X Chronicon. Paschale, in Praef. auctoris de Paschate, p. 5, edit. Du 
Fresne, Paris, 1688. 

§ See this matter discussed by Dr. Whitby in his Annotations on Mark 
xv. 25, and by Pfaffius in his Dissertatio Critica de genuinis librorum Novi 
Testamenti Lectionibus, cap. viii. p. 151 — 162, edit. Amstel. 1709, who par- 
ticularly considers what Mill hath advanced against this reading on Mark xv. 
25, and John xix. 14. 



408 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



Before we quit the subject of the Jewish hours, it is pro- 
per to take notice of the hours of prayer, which we find men- 
tioned in Scripture. Peter and John, it is said in the Acts, 
" went up into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the 
ninth hour;" chap. iii. 1. This, indeed, refers to the public 
prayers, offered up in the temple at the time of the evening 
sacrifice. But the Jews had also stated hours for private 
prayer, at least when they did not attend those which were 
public. It was Daniel's custom to pray three times a day, 
which he would not omit, though he was liable on that ac- 
count to be cast into the den of lions; Dan. vi. 10 — 12. 
The same was the practice of David : " Evening, and morn- 
ing," saith he, " and at noon, will I pray;" Psalm lv. 17. 
From whence we learn not only how frequently, but at what 
times of the day that duty was commonly performed. It is 
generally supposed, that the morning and evening prayers 
were at the time of offering the morning and evening sacrifice, 
that is, at the third and ninth hour. And the noon prayer 
was at the sixth hour, or twelve o'clock ; for it is said, that 
" Peter went up on the house top to pray, about the sixth 
hour;" Acts x. 9 : though Ludovicus Capellus makes the 
morning and the noon prayer to correspond to the morning 
and evening sacrifices. According to him, the morning 
prayer was performed any time between sun-rise and the 
fourth hour ; the noon prayer, between the sixth hour and 
sun-set; and evening prayer, any time between sun-set and 
break of day. # We find in Scripture no express institution 
of the stated hours of prayer. The Jews say, they received 
them from the patriarchs ; the first hour, from Abraham ; the 
second from Isaac ; and the third from Jacob. f 

From hence the Papists have borrowed their canonical 
hours ; as they call certain prayers, which are to be repeated 
at certain times of the day, namely, matins, lauds, vespers, 
and complins. Cardinal Baronius fancies they were instituted 
by the apostles ; of which he imagines, that Peter and John 
going into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth 

* Ludov. Capell. in Act. iii. 1, apud Crit. Sacr. See also Mishn. tit. 
Berachoth, cap. iv.; Bartenor. et Maimon. in loc; et annot. Guisii et 
Surenhus. torn. i. p. 13, 14, edit. Surenhus. 

f Vid. Drusii Prseter. in Act. iii. 1, sive apud Critic. Sacros. 



CHAP. I.] WEEKS. 409 

hour, is proof sufficient. Indeed, if we reject this evidence, 
there is none to be produced of their being instituted earlier 
than the ninth century, in a capitular* of Hatto, or Hetto, 
bishop of Basil, directed to his curates, enjoining that none 
of them be absent at the canonical hours. f 

From the Jews the Mohammedans have borrowed their 
hours of prayer, enlarging the number of them from three to 
five, which all Mussulmans are bound to observe ; the first in 
the morning before sun-rise ; the second, when noon is past, 
and the sun begins to decline from the meridian ; the third, 
in the afternoon, before sun-set ; the fourth, in the evening, 
after sun-set, and before the day be shut in ; the fifth, after 
the day is shut in, and before the first watch of the night .J 
. To these some of their devotees add two more ; the first, an 
hour and a half after the day is shut in, the other at mid- 
night ; but these are looked upon as voluntary services, prac- 
tised in imitation of Mohammed's example, but not enjoined 
by his law.§ 

We now proceed to consider the Jewish weeks; which, 
Godwin observes, were of two sorts ; the one ordinary, con- 
sisting of seven days ; the other extraordinary or prophetical, 
consisting of seven years. 

As for the ordinary week of seven days, it is a division of 
time, which appears to have been observed by all nations, 
probably from the beginning of the world. || It was first made 
by God himself, who, after he had created the world in six 
days, " rested on the seventh, and blessed the seventh day, 
and sanctified it;" Gen. ii. 2, 3. From whence every seventh 
day has been ever held sacred. 

To prove that this distinction of time prevailed in the first 
ages of the world, some allege the following passage of the 
book of Genesis: "In the end of the days, B*D» VP mikkets 

* A capitular is an act passed in a chapter, that is, in an assembly held 
by religious or military orders, for deliberating on their affairs, and regu- 
lating their discipline. 

t Du Pin's Eccles. Hist. cent. ix. vol. vii. p. 142. 

t See Sale's Preliminary Discourse to his Translation of the Koran, sect, 
iv. p. 107. 109, edit. 1734. 

§ De Dieu, Animadversiones in Act. iii. 1 . 

|| See Grotius, de Veritate Christianas Religionis, lib. i. sect. xvi. p. 45, 
46, notis Clerici, Glasg. 1745; Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. iii. cap. 
xvi. — xix. 



410 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 



jamim, Cain and Abel brought their offering to the Lord," 
chap. iv. 3 : that is, say they, at the end of the week, or on 
the sabbath-day ; for, according to the learned Gataker, there 
was then no other distinction of days but into weeks.* We 
may, however, observe, with deference to so great an au- 
thority, that it is not impossible, nor improbable, that by this 
time they might have learned to distinguish time, by the 
changes of the moon, into months ; and by the course of the 
sun, and the revolutions of the seasons, into years. It is very 
evident, that the phrase D«>D> ^pD mikkets jamim does not 
always import the end of a week, from the use of it in the 
Second Book of Samuel, chap. xiv. 26 ; where it is said, that 
" at the end of the days, Absalom polled his head, because 
his hair was heavy on him ; and he weighed it at two hundred 
shekels." It cannot be imagined his hair should grow so 
heavy as to need polling every week. Probably, in this place, 
the phrase means, as we render it, " at every year's end." 
In the same sense the learned Ainsworth understands it in 
the passage in Genesis, which we are now considering : "at 
the end of the year," when the fruits of the earth were ripe, 
" Cain brought of the fruits of the ground an offering unto 
the Lord." So God afterward appointed " a feast of in- 
gathering," to be observed by the Jews in the end of the year, 
"when they had gathered in their labours out of the field;" 
Exod. xxiii. 16. The same custom prevailed among the Gen- 
tiles, who at the end of the year, when they gathered in their 
fruits, offered solemn sacrifices, with thanks to God for his 
blessings. Aristotle says,f that the ancient sacrifices and as- 
semblies were after the gathering in of the fruits, being de- 
signed for an oblation of the first-fruits unto God. Again, 
days are put for years in the twenty-fifth chapter of Leviticus, 
ver. 29 : " within a year shall he redeem it :" in the Hebrew, 
jamim, which yet is immediately explained to signify a 
whole year. It is therefore probable, that it was at the end 
of the year, Cain brought of his ripe fruits an offering unto 
the Lord. 

Nevertheless, though the evidence of this passage, in favour 
of the antiquity of distinguishing time by weeks, fail us, we 
have other sufficient proofs of its being used in very early ages. 

* Vid. Poli. Synops. in Gen. iv. 3. 

f Aristot. Ethic, lib. viii. cap. ix. sub finem. 



CHAP. I.J 



WEEKS. 



411 



It appears, that Noah divided his days by sevens, in sending 
the dove out of the ark, Gen. viii. 10 — 13; and that the 
same division was used in Jacob's time ; for in the history of 
his marriage with Leah and Rachel, we meet with this ex- 
pression, " Laban said, Fulfil her week, ynttf shebhuang, and we 
will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve 
with me yet seven other years;" chap. xxix. 27. That the 
word shebhuang here signifies a week of days, is plain 
from its being expressly distinguished from seven years ; and 
also because it was the custom in ancient times to keep mar- 
riage feasts for seven days. It is said of Samson's wife, that 
ft she wept before him the seven days, while their marriage- 
feast lasted," in order to obtain from him the interpretation of 
a riddle, for explaining which " within the seven days of the 
feast," he had offered a reward to his guests; Judges xiv. 12. 17. 

As for the extraordinary or prophetical weeks, they con- 
sisted of seven years each. And it is not unlikely, that this 
sort of computation by weeks of years, which is used in the 
prophetic writings, owed its origin to the expressions in which 
Moses records the institution of the year of jubilee : " Thou 
shalt number seven sabbaths of years unto thee, seven times 
seven years ; and the space of the seven sabbaths of years 
shall be unto thee forty and nine years : then shalt thou cause 
the trumpet of the jubilee to sound, and ye shall hallow the 
fiftieth year ;" Lev. xxv. 8 — 10. Accordingly a day is put 
for a year in Ezekiel, where three hundred and ninety days 
means as many years, and forty days forty years : "I have 
appointed thee, saith the Lord, each day for a year ;" chap, 
iv. 5, 6. In the same sense seven days, or a week, is in the 
prophetic style seven years. Of this sort are the seventy 
weeks in the ninth chapter of Daniel's prophecy, ver. 24, 
which appears from hence, that having occasion immediately 
after this prophecy to mention weeks in the ordinary accep- 
tation of the word, he expressly calls them, by way of dis- 
tinction from the weeks he had been before speaking of, 
"weeks of days," chap. x. 1 — 3 ; for so is the expression in 
the original, which we render, " three full weeks. " # Besides, 

* Mayer de Temporibus et Festis Hebraeor. part i. cap. x. sect. v. p. 65, 
edit. Amstel. 1724 ; Marshall's Chronological Treatise on the ^Seventy Weeks 
of Daniel, p. 8, 9, Lond. 1724. 



412 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



it is certain, that so many great events as are predicted to 
come to pass in the space of seventy weeks, could not be 
crowded into seventy weeks of days, which is less than one 
year and a half. The seventy prophetical weeks, therefore, 
amount to four hundred and ninety years. 

Months, with the Hebrews, take their name from the moon ; 
the word Win chodhesh, being used by them to signify both a 
new moon, and a month ; because their months began with a 
new moon. And therefore they consisted of twenty-nine or 
thirty days ; for since the sy nodical lunar month is nearly 
twenty-nine days and a half, they made their months to con- 
sist of twenty-nine and thirty days alternately ; so that what 
one month wanted -of being equal to the synodical course of 
the moon, was made up in the next ; and by this means their 
months were made to keep even pace, pretty nearly, with the 
lunations. Thus was the Jewish calendar regulated by the 
law of Moses, which appointed the day of the new moon, or 
rather perhaps the first day of its appearance, to be a solemn 
festival, and the beginning of a month. But it should seem, 
that at the time of the deluge they were not come to this 
regulation ; but then the years consisted of twelve months, 
and each month of thirty days. That the year consisted of 
twelve months, may be inferred from the time that Noah lived 
in the ark, namely, a year and ten days ; for the flood began 
on the seventeenth day of the second month of the six hun- 
dredth year of Noah's life (see Gen. vii. 11), and on the 
twenty-seventh of the second month, in the six hundred and 
first year of his life, was the earth dried ; chap. viii. 13, 14. # 
Now if the month consisted of thirty days, as we shall pre- 
sently show that it did ; and if the year then in use was nearly 
either lunar or solar, there must have been twelve months in 
the year ; for thirty multiplied by twelve is three hundred and 
sixty, that is, six days more than the lunar year, and five less 

* In the thirteenth verse it is said, that "in the six hundred and first 
year, the first day of the month, the waters were dried from the earth, and 
Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and behold the face of 
the ground was dry." This must be understood of the waters being so far 
dried from off the. face of the earth, that they no longer stood on the ground ; 
nevertheless, the earth was not sufficiently hardened to be fit for habitation 
till near two months after, when, on the twenty-seventh day of the second 
month, Noah left the ark. 



CHAP. I.] 



MONTHS, 



413 



than the solar. Perhaps the form of the year then used was 
the same afterward used by the Egyptians, consisting of 
twelve months and five days. 

That the month, in Noah's time, consisted of thirty days, is 
made out thus. It is said in the account of the deluge, that 
" in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the 
fountains of the great deep were broken up," chap. vii. 11; 
and afterward it is said, " the ark rested in the seventh 
month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the moun- 
tains of Ararat;" chap. viii. 4. From the beginning of the 
flood, therefore, to the time of the ark's resting, was just five 
months. Now the waters are said to have prevailed upon the 
earth one hundred and fifty days, chap. vii. 24; viii. 3, 4. 
that is, till the time of the ark's resting ; and one hundred and 
fifty divided by five, the number of the months, gives just 
thirty days for each month. 

From this account of the antediluvian months and years, 
we may infer the absurdity of the supposition, which Varro 
and others have made, in order to take off the wonder of 
men's living so long before the flood, as the Scripture history 
relates; namely, that their ages are to be computed, not by 
solar years, but by months ; whereas it plainly appears, that 
they computed by months and years before the flood, as we 
now do, and that their years were nearly equal to ours ; and 
it cannot be thought so good an historian as Moses would use 
the word years for months only, in some part of his antedilu- 
vian history, and for twelve months in other parts of it. Be- 
sides, this way of computing will reduce the lives of the an- 
cient patriarchs to a shorter period than ours. Peleg, who is 
said to have lived two hundred and thirty-nine years, Gen. xi. 
19, will be found in reality to have lived only about twenty 
years ; and Serug, who is said to have lived two hundred and 
thirty years, chap. xi. 23, must have lived but a little more 
than nineteen; and both of them must have begot children 
before they were three years old, instead of thirty, according 
to the Scripture account. 

Godwin is undoubtedly mistaken, when he saitli, " that the 
Jews before their captivity, counted their months without any 
names, according to their number, as the first, the second 



414 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



month, &c." For we meet with the names of months in the 
Scripture history long before that period ; as the month Abib, 
Exod. xiii. 4; the month Zif, 1 Kings vi. 1. 37; the month 
Bui, ver. 38; and the month Ethanim; chap. viii. 2. 

We proceed now to consider the Jewish year, which was 
partly lunar and wandering, and partly solar and fixed. It 
consisted sometimes of twelve, and sometimes of thirteen 
synodical months ; ordinarily it consisted of twelve synodical 
months, amounting to three hundred and fifty-four days. As 
the years of this form fall eleven days short of the solar year, 
had they used them constantly, their months and festivals 
would have wandered in thirty-two years through all the sea- 
sons. But since the rites they were to perform at some of 
their festivals had a necessary connexion with a particular 
season of the year ; as the offering the first-fruits of the wheat- 
harvest at the feast of pentecost, which must necessarily be 
kept in the summer, and their dwelling in booths at the feast 
of tabernacles, which would have been highly inconvenient in 
winter; it was necessary by some means to reduce the lunar 
years to the solar, that their months, and consequently their 
festivals, might always fall at the same season. This therefore 
they did by adding a whole month to the year, as often as it 
was needful, commonly once in three, and sometimes once in 
two years. This intercalary month was added at the end of 
the year, after the month Adar, and was therefore called ~nNi 
veadar, or a second Adar.* 

The year was also distinguished into the civil and sacred 
year; each of which had a different beginning. The civil be- 
gan with the equinoctial new moon in autumn ; the sacred, or 
ecclesiastical, with the equinoctial new moon in spring. The 
civil, according to which all political matters were regulated, 
was the more ancient, and was perhaps the same with the 
patriarchal year, which we gave an account of before, and 
which is supposed to have originally commenced at the crea- 
tion. Hence, since this year began in autumn, some have 
thought it probable the world was created at that season, or 
in its autumnal state, with respect to that hemisphere in which 

* Maimon. de Consecratione Calendarum, cap. iv. sect. i. p. 356, ad 
calcem tractatus de sacrificiis, edit, et vers. De Veil, Lond. 1683. 



CHAP. I.] 



YEARS. 



415 



Adam was placed.* But the premises, from which this in- 
ference is drawn, are somewhat uncertain, namely, that the 
ancient year was a fixed solar year, always beginning at the 
same season ; whereas we have before shown, that the patri- 
archal year consisted of twelve months of thirty days each, 
which fell about five days short of the true solar year. Un- 
less, therefore, we suppose, as some have done,f that they 
added five days to their last month, according to the form of 
the annus Nabonassarius, or the Egyptian year,J which five 
days were called i^pai enayojuLevai, this year must have been 
wandering, and the beginning of it have run through all the 
seasons. Nay, even supposing the addition of the rifispat ena- 
yofievai, yet the neglect of five hours forty-nine minutes, by 
which the Egyptian year fell short of the true solar year, would 
make the beginning of it wander through all the seasons in 
about fourteen hundred years ; so that, though it happened to 
begin at the autumnal equinox at the time when Moses regu- 
lated the Jewish calendar, it might have begun originally at 
another season. However, it is thought, that the feast of 
in-gathering of the harvest, which must certainly be at autumn, 
being said to be " in the end of the year," Exod. xxiii. 16, 
xxxiv. 22, favours the opinion that the ancient year begun at 
that season. Therefore, though some have supposed, that the 
world was created in spring,^ the more commonly received 
opinion is, that it was created in autumn. In support of 
which some allege the following passage in the first chapter 
of Genesis, " The earth brought forth grass, the herb yielding 
seed, and the fruit-tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose 
seed is in itself/' ver. 11; which, they say, must be in au- 
tumn, when the fruits are ripe. 

As for the Jewish sacred, or ecclesiastical year, it began 

* Vid. Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis Hebrseor, part i. cap. i. p. 4 — 17, 
Amstel. 1724; et Fred. Spanhemii Chronol. Sacr. part i. cap. i.; Talmud, 
tit. Rosh Hashanah, cap. i.; Abarbanel de Principio, Anni et Consecratione 
Novilunii ad Calcem, lib. Cozri, p. 443 — 445, edit. Buxtorf. 1660. 

f Vid. Spanheim. Chronol. Sacr. part i. cap. iii. p. 8, Oper. Geograph. 
Chronolog. &c. Lugd. Bat. 1701. 

t See Strauchius's Chronology, by Sault, book iv. chap, xviii. p. 261, 
Lond. 1722. 

§ Jacobi Capelli Observ. in Gen. i. 14, p. 583, edit, una cum Lud. 
Capell. Comment, et Not. Critic, in Vet. Test., Amstel. 1689. 



416 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



with the month Nisan, the seventh of the civil year, about the 
vernal equinox; Exod. xii. 2, et seq. By this year the order 
of all their religious ceremonies was regulated ; so that the 
passover, which was kept in the middle of the first month of 
this year, was, as it were, the mother of all the other festivals. 

While the Jews continued in the land of Canaan, the be- 
ginnings of their months and years were not settled by any 
astronomical rules or calculations, but by the phasis or actual 
appearance of the new moon. When they saw the new moon, 
they began the month. Persons were therefore appointed to 
watch on the tops of the mountains for the first appearance 
of the moon after the change. As soon as they saw it, they 
informed the Sanhedrim, and public notice was given by 
lighting beacons throughout the land ; though after they had 
been often deceived by the Samaritans, who kindled false 
fires, they used, say the mishnical rabbies, to proclaim its ap- 
pearance by sending messengers. Yet as they had no months 
longer than thirty days, if they did not see the new moon the 
night following the thirtieth day, they concluded the appear- 
ance was obstructed by the clouds, and without watching any 
longer, made the next day the first day of the following 
month.* But after the Jews became dispersed through all 
nations, where they had no opportunity of being informed of 
the first appearance of the new moon, as they formerly had, 
they were forced to make use of astronomical calculations and 
cycles for fixing the beginning of their months and years.f 
The first cycle they made use of for this purpose was of eighty- 
four years. But that being discovered to be faulty, they came 
afterward into the use of Meto's cycle of nineteen years, 
which was established by the authority of Rabbi Hillel Han- 
nasi, or prince of the Sanhedrim, about the year of Christ 
360. This they still use, and say, it is to be observed till the 
coming of the Messiah. In the compass of this cycle there 
are twelve common years, consisting of twelve months, and 
seven intercalary years, consisting of thirteen months. J 

We find the Jews and their ancestors computing their years 

* Vid. Mish. tit. Rosh. Hashanah, cap. ii. sect. i. — vii.; Maimon. de 
Consecratione Calendarum, cap. iii. sect. v. — viii. p. 352. 
f Maimon. de Consecratione Calendarum, cap. v. sect. i. — iii. p. 362; 
X See Prideaux's Connect, part i. preface. 



CHAP. I.] 



YEARS. 



417 



from different eras, in different parts of the Old Testament; 
as from the birth of the patriarchs ; for instance, of Noah, 
Gen. vii. 11; viii. 13; afterward from their exit out of 
Egypt, Numb, xxxiii. 38; 1 Kings vi. 1; then from the 
building of Solomon's temple, 2 Chron. viii. 1 ; and from the 
reigns of the kings of Judah and Israel. In later times the 
Babylonish captivity furnished them with a new epocha, from 
whence they computed their years: Ezek. xxxiii. 21; xl. 1. 
But since the times of the talmudical rabbies they have con- 
stantly used the era of the creation, which, according to their 
computation, # in this present year of the Christian era, 1762, 
is A. M. 5522. They usually in writing contract this by omit- 
ting the thousands, writing only 20pn, 522 .f If to the Jewish 
year, thus expressed, you add 1240, it gives the year of the 
Christian era, as 522 with the addition of 1240 makes 17624 

If it be inquired, why God appointed a new beginning of 
the year to the Israelites at the time of their deliverance out 
of Egypt, the answer may perhaps be, 

1st. The more effectually to distinguish and separate his 
own people from the idolatrous nations, and detach them from 
their customs ; to which end the beginning their days, their 
weeks, their months, and their years, at a different time from 
those of the idolaters, was undoubtedly subservient. 

2dly. Because the month, in which they were delivered out 
of Egypt, and in which such a surprising series of miracles was 
wrought in their favour, might be well accounted a sort of 
mensis natalis of that nation, in which God as it were revived 
them from a state of death, and took them under his future 
special protection and providence ; on which account, to set a 
particular mark upon that month, and to perpetuate the 
memory of so great a mercy, he ordered, that it should stand 
at the head of the months, and be reckoned the first of the 
year. 

* The Jews reckon only 3760 years from the creation to the birth of 
Christ. See Scalig. de Emendat. Tempor. lib. vii. p. 628, and Strauchius's 
Chronol. by Sault, book iv. chap. ii. p. 168 — 171. 

f This is called the computus minor ; when the thousands are expressed 
at length it is called computus major. 

X Reland, Antiq. Heb, part iv. cap. i. sect. viii. p. 428, 429, 3d edit, 

2 E 



CHAPTER II. 



OF THEIR FEASTS. 



" As, among the Jews, their ordinary meals," saith Godwin, 
" were not many in a day, so neither were they costly ; and 
therefore they were called nmN aruchoth, which properly sig- 
nifieth such fare as travellers use on their journeys ; whereas 
the extraordinary and more liberal kind of entertainment was 
commonly called nnttfD mishteh." There is no doubt, but the 
word nmN aruchah, as it comes from the root mN arach, iter 
fecit, properly and primarily signifies provisions on a journey, 
or such a meal as was common with travellers, which can 
hardly be supposed to have been either elegant or plentiful in 
those countries where there were no inns or houses of enter- 
tainment on the road, and where travellers used to carry 
their provisions with them; and though, as Godwin observes, 
the word is used for a mean and scanty meal in the book of 
Proverbs, chap. xv. 17, where p> nmN aruchathjarak, a din- 
ner of herbs, stands in opposition to a stalled or fatted ox ; 
nevertheless, as the whole life of man is represented as a pil- 
grimage or journey, the word nmN aruchah, in an allusive 
sense, is used for a meal in general, whether sumptuous or 
mean, whether plentiful or sparing. In the book of Jeremiah, 
chap. lii. 34, it is used for the daily provision which the king 
of Bubylon allotted to Jehoiakim king of Judah, after he had 
brought him out of prison, and set his throne above the thrones 
of all the kings that were with him in Babylon, and admitted 
him to eat bread continually before him, ver. 31 — 33 ; and no 
doubt the provisions of his table were plentiful and elegant. 

The word nTOD mishteh, from nnttf shathah, Mbit, answers 
to the Greek avfmomov, and primarily signifies compotatio; or 
perhaps, as we call it, a drinking bout. And as delicious 



CHAP. II.] 



FEASTS. 



419 



liquors were always supposed to make a considerable part of 
an elegant entertainment, the word nnttfD mishfeh is used, 
by a synecdoche, for a feast in general; such as Abraham 
made at the weaning of Isaac, Gen. xxi. 8; Pharaoh on his 
birth-day, chap. xl. 20; Samson at his wedding, Judges xiv. 
10 ; and Isaac for Abimelech and his friends, who, it is ex- 
pressly said, ate as well as drank; chap. xxvi. 30, " A feast 
of fat things" is called nnttfD mishteh, as well as " a feast of 
wine;" Isa. xxv. 6. And as the Hebrews sometimes deno- 
minated their feasts from drinking, so likewise from eating : 
" Jacob offered sacrifice on the mount, and called his bre- 
thren to eat bread/' &c; Gen, xxxi. 54. Belshazzar made 
a great feast, Dnb lechem (Dan. v. 1; see also Eccles. x. 19); 
which primarily signifies bread. At other times it Was de- 
nominated from both : " Come, eat of my bread, and drink 
of the wine which I have mingled:" Prov. ix. 5; see also 
Eccles. ix. 7. 

It is Godwin's opinion, that the agapa, or love feasts, of 
the primitive Christians, were derived from the D\an chiggim, 
or feasts upon the sacrifices, at which the Jews entertained 
their friends and fed the poor; Deut. xii. 18; xxvi. 12. 

There were also feasts of much the same kind in use 
among the Greeks and Romans. The former were wont to 
offer certain sacrifices to their gods, which were afterward 
given to the poor. They had likewise public feasts for cer- 
tain districts, suppose for a town or city, toward which all 
who could afford it, contributed, in proportion to their different 
abilities, and all partook of it in common. Of this sort were 
the *2ivaaitia of the Cretans ; and the <£t§wia of the Lacedemo- 
nians, instituted by Lycurgus, and so called wapa rrje <j)i\taQ 
(the X being changed into § according to their usual orthogra- 
phy), as denoting that love and friendship which they were 
intended to promote among neighbours and fellow-citizens.* 

The Romans likewise had a feast of the same kind, called 
charistia ; which was a meeting only of those who were akin 
to each other; and the design of it was, that if any quarrel or 
misunderstanding had happened among any of them, they 

* Vid. Oragium de RepubL Lacedasm. lib. i. cap. ix. ; apud Gronov 
Thesaur. Grsec. Antiq. vol; v. p. 2541 ; et Stuckii Antiquitat Convivial, 
lib. i. cap. xxxi. 

2 e 2 



420 



J EWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK HI. 



might there be reconciled.* To this Ovid alludes in the 
second book of his Fasti : 

Proxima cognati dixere charistia chari, 
Et venit ad socio s turba propinqua deos. 

V. 617. 

In imitation either of these Jewish or Gentile love feasts, 
or probably of both, the primitive Christians, in each particular 
church, had likewise their love feasts, which were supplied by 
the contribution of the members, according to their several 
abilities, and partaken of by all in common. And whether 
they were converts from among the Jews or Gentiles, they 
retained their old custom with very little alteration, and as 
their ay curat had been commonly annexed to their sacrifices, 
so they were now annexed to the commemoration of the sa- 
crifice of Christ at the Lord's supper ; and were therefore held 
on the Lord's day before or after the celebration of that or- 
dinance. It should seem at Corinth, in the apostle's days, 
they were ordinarily held before ; for when the Corinthians 
are blamed for unworthily receiving the Lord's supper, it is 
partly charged upon this, that some of them came drunk to 
that ordinance, having indulged to excess at the preceding- 
love feast: ie Every one taketh before, wpoXajULfdavsi, his own 
supper, and one is hungry and another is drunken ;" 1 Cor. 
xi. 21.+ This shows, saith Dr. Whitby, that this banquet, 
namely the love feast, was celebrated before the Lord's sup- 
per. But Chrysostom gives an account of it, as being in his 
time kept after it.J 

It is commonly supposed, that when St. Jude mentions 
certain persons, who were spots in the feasts of charity, 
ev raig ayawatg, ver 12, he means in the Christian love 
feasts ; though Dr. Lightfoot and Dr. Whitby apprehend the 
reference in this passage is rather to a custom of the Jews, 
who on the evening of their sabbath had their KOivwvm, or com- 

* Valer. Maxim, lib. ii. cap. i. sect. viii. p. 136, edit. Thysii. Lugd. Bat. 
1655. 

f See Whitby in loc. 

X Vid. Suiceri Thesaur. in verb ayairt]. This opinion is maintained by 
Mr.Hallet in his Notes and Discourses, vol. iii. disc, vi., and by Dr. Chand- 
ler in his account of the Conference in Nicholas-Lane, Feb. 13, 1734-5, be- 
tween two Romish priests and some Protestant divines, p. 55 — 62. 



CHAP. 11.] 



FEASTS. 



421 



munion, when the inhabitants of the same city met in a com- 
mon place to eat together.* However that be, all antiquity 
bears testimony to the reality of the Christian ayairai, or love 
feasts. Indeed, Suicer conceives they are referred to in the 
following passage of the Acts : " They," that is, the apostles, 
** continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and break- 
ing bread from house to house, did eat their meat with glad- 
ness and singleness of heart chap. ii. 46. And when it is 
said, that " the twelve called the multitude of the disciples 
unto them, and said, It is not reason that we should leave 
the word of God, and serve tables," chap. vi. 2, he supposes 
the tables mean these love feasts : which expression, I think, 
primarily refers to the tables of the poor of the church, or to 
the making a proper provision for them ; as appears from its 
having been mentioned as the ground of complaint of " the 
Grecians against the Hebrews, that their widows were neg- 
lected in the daily ministration," ver. 1. To the love feasts 
he likewise refers the following passage concerning St. Paul : 
" When he had broken bread, and eaten, and talked a long 
while, even till break of day, he departed ;" chap. xx. 11. But 
this may very naturally and properly be understood of the 
Lord's supper. Indeed, how far St. Paul might join in these 
love feasts with other Christians, before they were abused, does 
not appear. But when he blamed the scandalous irregula- 
rities of the Corinthians, in their participation of the Lord's 
supper, which were very much occasioned by their preceding 
love feasts, and in order to bring them back to its original 
simplicity and purity, gives them a very particular account of 
the primitive institution, 1 Cor. xi. 23, et seq., in which there 
is not one word of these agap& ; he evidently condemns the 
addition they had made to this ordinance, which had occa- 
sioned so much sin, and so many disorders and confusions. 

However, the agapcz were not wholly laid aside till some 
ages after. For they are mentioned by Ignatius,f by Cle- 
mens of Alexandria,^ by Tertullian,^ and even by St. 

* Whitby in loc. and Lightfoot, Horse Hebraic. 1 Cor. x. 16. 
f Epist. ad Smyrn. sect. viii. apud Coteler. Patres Apostol. p. 37, vol. ii. 
edit. Clerici 2, 1724. 

X Paedag.lib. ii. p. 141, B, et Strom, lib. iii. p. 430, C, D, ed. Paris, 1641. 
§ Apolog. cap. xxxix. p. 32, edit. Rigalt. Paris, 1675, 



422 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111 



Jerome* and St. Austin f in the fourth century, as practised 
in their times. 

Dr. Lightfoot hath a peculiar notion concerning these 
Christian agapa, that they were a sort of hospitals for the 
entertainment of strangers, in imitation of those which the 
Jews had adjoining to their synagogues. And Gains, who 
is called "the host of the whole church," Rom. xvi. 23, he 
supposes to have been the master of such an hospital ; and 
that Phcebe, who is called the Smicovoc of the church at Cen- 
chrea, chap. xvi. 1, and those other women, who in the Epistle 
to the Philippians are said to labour in the gospel, chap. iv. 3, 
were servants attending these hospitals. Nevertheless, he does 
not call in question the ancient use of love feasts together 
with the eucharist : to doubt of that, he says, would be to 
contradict all antiquity. But he seems to question, whether 
they were so ancient as the days of the apostles. J However, 
notwithstanding all the doctor has said, on the authority of 
the rabbies, of these Jewish hospitals, which he supposes the 
Christians to have imitated in their agapa, it may reasonably 
be doubted, whether they had ordinarily such hospitals ad- 
joining to their churches so early as the days of the apostles ; 
for as yet they had hardly any churches or buildings appro- 
priated to Christian worship, but were forced to meet in pri- 
vate houses, and often secretly, to avoid the rage and violence 
of their persecutors. Nor can I think it so probable, that the 
Corinthians, who were for the most part Gentile converts, 
should borrow the institution of such hospitals from the Jews, 
as that they should borrow their former custom, and that of 
their ancestors, in annexing love feasts to their sacrifices, and 
so adopt them into Christian worship. 

Godwin hath discoursed pretty largely on the ceremonies 
used by the Jews at their feasts. And under the head of 
salutation, as one of their preparatory ceremonies, he occa- 
sionally mentions the prophet Elisha's order to his servant 
Gehazi, " If thou meet with any man, salute him not ; and if 
any man salute thee, answer him not again 2 Kings iv. 29. 
It is inquired, whether this is to be taken for a general pro- 

* Ad Eustoc. de Custod. Virgin, epist. xxii. p. 286, D, Paris, 1579. 
f Contra Faustum Manich. lib. xx. cap. xx. 
I See Hor. Hebraic. 1 Cor. xi. 21. 



CHAP. II.] 



SALUTATIONS. 



423 



hibition of all ceremonies betokening civil respect, according 
to the usage of the modern Quakers; or only as an injunction 
peculiar to the present occasion? I apprehend, there is no 
reason to take it for a general prohibition, since in the Scrip- 
ture history, we find such ceremonies of civil respect prac- 
tised by good men, without any censure passed upon them ; 
as by Moses to his father-in-law, Exod. xviii. 7; by Abra- 
ham to the three angels, whom he took for three men, Gen. 
xviii. 2; and afterward to the children of Heth ; chap, xxiii. 
7. Besides, when our Saviour sent forth the twelve apostles 
to preach, he enjoined them to pay to all persons and families, 
where they came, the usual tokens of civility and respect: 
" When ye come into a house, salute it;" Matt. x. 12. The 
reason, then, of Elisha's forbidding his servant either to give, 
or return, a salutation to any man, was probably either on 
account of the expedition which the prophet supposed his 
journey to the Shunamite required (for perhaps he did not un- 
derstand her child was quite dead, when he ordered Gehazi to 
go and lay his staff on it) ; or else it might be to keep tlte 
child's death, out of tenderness, a secret to the father, till he 
was raised to life again ; and if the servant so much as spoke 
to any person on the road, he might imprudently divulge it. 

This may enable us to account for a prohibition of the same 
kind, given by Christ to the seventy disciples, when he sent 
them " two and two before his face, to every city and place, 
whither he himself would come;" Luke x. 1.4. ** Carry," 
saith he, *' neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes, and salute no 
man by the way." We may with equal reason suppose, that 
our Lord intended to forbid his disciples and ministers the 
use of shoes and purses, as the customary tokens of civil re- 
spect. His design was only to prohibit them while they were 
employed on that particular message. It is farther inquired, 
why he forbad it at this time ? Dr. Lightfoot, from the rab- 
bies, observes, that it was the custom of the Jews, during the 
days of their mourning, not to salute any one. He conceives, 
therefore, that our Saviour would have his disciples appear 
like mourners ; partly as representing himself, who was a 
man of sorrow, that so from these messengers the people 
might guess, in some measure, what sort of person he was 
who sent them ; partly, as they were to summon the people to 



424 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK 111. 



attend upon Christ, in order to be healed, both of their 
spiritual and their bodily diseases; and it was, therefore, fit 
their behaviour should be mournful and solemn, in token of 
their fellow-feeling with the afflicted and miserable.* 

But the testimony of the rabbies is too week a foundation 
to support this interpretation . The custom mentioned might 
have prevailed in their times without being near so ancient as 
our Saviour's. It may also be objected, that our blessed 
Lord was so far from desiring his disciples should appear as 
mourners, that he represents this to be unsuitable to their 
condition, while he, the bridegroom, was with them; Matt, 
ix. 15. 

Perhaps, therefore, the prohibition of saluting any man by 
the way may be taken in a more general sense, as a caution 
against trifling away their time in compliment and ceremony. 
Or, if we understand it more literally, it might be designed to 
make the disciples appear as men in haste, and fully occupied, 
whose minds were intent on the dispatch of the most import- 
ant business ; to awaken the people's attention to their mes- 
sage, and at the same time, like the symbolical actions of the 
prophets, to represent in a sensible manner the main drift 
and tenor of it, namely, that sinners should make all possible 
speed to fly from the wrath to come, and lay hold on eternal 
life, and for that end should apply to Christ in earnest and 
without delay. 

The second preparatory ceremony, mentioned by Godwin, 
is washing the feet of the guests. However, it does not ap- 
pear in the institution of any of the Jewish feasts, nor by any 
Scripture examples, that this was ever used, except when per- 
sons had defiled their feet by travelling. And, indeed, if it 
had been a constant custom, I can hardly think, that Simon 
the Pharisee, who civilly invited our Lord to an entertainment 
at his house, would have omitted it; Luke vii. 44. 

The instance produced, namely, our Saviour's washing his 
disciples' feet, John xiii. 5, is quite beside the purpose; since 
that was plainly an extraordinary case, performed, not out of 
respect to any custom, but with a particular intent of instruct- 
ing them in the duties of humility and condescending bene- 
volence ; ver. 13 — 15. Besides, this was not done be- 
* Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. Luc. x. 4, 



CHAP. II.] 



THE SIX WATER-POTS. 



425 



fore they began supper, but in some interval of the meal, as 
appears from its being said of our Lord, that * he arose from 
supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel and 
girded himself," ver. 4. We conclude from hence, that the 
disciples had not washed their feet before supper ; for it is 
highly improbable, that Christ should choose to set them an 
example of mutual condescension and benevolence by an 
action, which, if they had been washed before, was altogether 
needless. # 

It is Godwin's apprehension, that the six water-pots of 
stone, mentioned on occasion of the marriage at Cana of 
Galilee, John ii. 6, and said to be " after the manner of the 
purifying of the Jews," were designed for these complimental 
washings. But as the word KaOapicrfiog is commonly, if not 
always, used for the purifying or washing the whole body, as 
for the purifying of a woman after child-birth, Luke ii. 22, 
and of a leper after his cure, chap. v. 14; Mark i. 44; in 
both which cases the law prescribed that the body should be 
washed or bathed all over; some have thought it more pro- 
bable, that these water-pots were such as were used for that 
purpose. And if we consider how many legal pollutions, 
unavoidably and frequently contracted, required this larger 
purification, especially among the women, it is likely that all 
persons, who could provide conveniences for it, would keep 
sufficient quantities of water in their houses ready for such 
occasions. According to this opinion, these water-pots must 
have been large vessels. How large is not certain. The 
text says, they " contained two or three fxerp^Tac apiece;" a 
word which, though it properly signifies a measure in the ge- 
neral, was yet doubtless in common use for some particular 
measure; otherwise, this account of the contents of these 
water-pots would be altogether indeterminate, and convey no 
idea at all. It is probable, therefore, that as the word rod, 
in English, which primarily signifies a stick to measure with, 
of any length, is yet appropriated to that particular measure 
of length which is most used in measuring lands, namely, five 
yards and a half, the word jmerpr]Tr} was particularly appro- 

* That washing the feet was not an usual preparatory ceremony, is shown 
at large by Buxtorf, in his Dissert. Philolog. Theolog. dissert, vi. de Csense 
Domin. primae ritibus et forma, sect. xxx. p. 302 — 306, Basil. 1662. 



426 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES, 



[BOOK 111. 



priated to that measure of capacity which was most used by 
the Jews in measuring liquids, and that was the TO hath. 
This is still more probable, because the Septuagint renders 
the word bath, by /utrpnrrj, in the fourth chapter of the Second 
Book of Chronicles, ver. 5. Now the bath, according to Dr. 
Cumberland, contains seven gallons and a quarter. Each 
water-pot, therefore, may be supposed to contain about 
twenty gallons, and all of them, when filled to the brim, as 
they were when our Saviour turned the w r ater into wine, 
about a hundred and twenty.* 

As to the design of this miracle, we are not to suppose 
that Christ produced so great a quantity of wine, merely or 
chiefly for use of the guests at that entertainment. Besides 
the grand purpose of displaying his divine power, he might 
hereby intend to make a handsome present to the new-married 
couple, as such a quantity of excellent w 7 ine undoubtedly was, 
in grateful return for their favour in inviting him and his 
disciples to the marriage feast. 

As to the third preparatory ceremony, pouring out oil, I 
can find no sufficient evidence of this being in common use. 
The woman's anointing our Saviour's head with ointment, 
which St. Luke mentions, chap. vii. 37, 38, and to which 
Godwin refers, was without doubt an extraordinary case. 

As to the rD"Q barachah, or benediction of the bread and 
wine, from whence many others suppose, as well as Godwin, 
that our Saviour borrowed the rites which he used in the 
celebration of his supper; the authority of the rabbinical wri- 
ters, who mention this barachah, is too precarious to furnish 
a certain conclusion, that it was in use among the Jews in our 
Saviour's time. The correspondence between the sacramental 
rites and those of the Jewish barachah, as practised in the 
days of the talmudical rabbies, may be seen at large in Bux- 
torf on this subject .f 

The last thing which Godwin mentions as remarkable in the 
feasts of the Jews, was their table gesture :J and this was 

* See on this subject a Dissertation of Hostus, in the Critici Sacri, vol. ix. 

f Buxtorf. Dissertationes Philolog. Theolog. dissert, de Csenae Domin. 
primae ritibus et forma . 

X Vid. Buxtorf. ubi supra, sect, xxxii. — xl. p. 306 — 309; et Lightfoot, 
Horse Hebr. in Matt. xxvi. 20. 



CHAP. II.] 



FEASTS. 



427 



reclining on couches after the manner of the Romans,* the 
upper part of the body resting upon the left elbow, and the 
lower lying at length upon the couch. When two or three 
reclined on the same couch, some say the worthiest or most 
honourable person lay first; Lightfoot says, in the middle .f 
The next in dignity lay with his head reclining on the breast 
or bosom of the first ; as John is said to have done on the 
bosom of Jesus at supper ; John xiii. 23. And hence is bor- 
rowed the phrase of Abraham's bosom, as denoting the state 
of celestial happiness ; Luke xvi. 22. Abraham being esteemed 
the most honourable person, and the father of the Jewish na- 
tion, to be in his bosom signifies, in allusion to the order in 
which guests were placed at an entertainment, the highest 
state of felicity next to that of Abraham himself. 

* Plutarchi Sympos. lib. v. problem, vi. p. 769. 780, edit. Francofurt, 
1620. See the accubitus of the Romans described, with a delineation from 
some antique marbles, by Hieron. Mercurialis, de Arte Gymnast, lib. i. 
cap. xi. Amstel. 1672. 

f Horae IJebr. John xiii. 23. 



CHAPTER III. 



OF THE SABBATH, 

The word sabbath, from D2W shabath, quievit, is used in 
Scripture, in a limited sense, for the seventh day of the week, 
which, by the Jewish law, was peculiarly consecrated to the 
service of God ; and, in a more extensive sense, for other holy 
days, as for the annual fast, or day of atonement, on the 
tenth of the month Tizri, Lev. xxiii. 32 ; and, in the New 
Testament, the word <ra/3j3arov is sometimes used for a week : 
" I fast twice in a week," N^otcvw dig tov caj3j3arou, Luke 
xviii. 12; and fua <raj3j3arwv signifies the first day of the 
week; Matt, xxviii. 1. But commonly the word sabbath is 
peculiarly appropriated to the seventh day. 

In the sixth chapter of St. Luke, we read of the <ra/3/3arojv 
$zvTepo7Tp(i>Tov, ver. 1 ; the explaining of which has given 
the critics and commentators not a little trouble. Some al- 
lege there were two sabbaths in the year, each of them called 
the first, in respect to the two different beginnings of the year, 
the civil and the sacred. That the Jews had some peculiar 
regard to the first sabbath in the year, appears from a passage 
in Clemens Alexandrinus, zav ertXrjvr) (j>avy, oraj3/3arov ovk 
ay ovai to XcyojUfvov, irpwrov* " Nisi luna appareat, sabbatum 
non celebrant quod primum dicitur," &c. Now, as their 
year had two different beginnings, one with the month Tizri 
in autumn, the other with the month Nisan in spring, there 
were consequently two first sabbaths, of which this, according 
to the computation of the civil year, was the second, and is 
therefore called devTEpoirpujTov, or the second-first sabbath. 

Grotius, whose opinion is followed by Dr. Hammond, con- 
ceives, that when any of the solemn yearly feasts fell on the 
sabbath-day, that sabbath had a special respect paid to it, and 
was called fxtya, or (which Dr. Hammond saith is the same 
* Strom, lib. vi. p. 636, A, edit. Paris, 1741. 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



429 



thing) aafifiarov npajrov. Now, of these prime or first sab- 
baths, there were three in the year, at the passover, at pente- 
cost, and at the feast of tabernacles. The first of them, that 
is, when the first day of the passover fell on the sabbath-day, 
was called 7rjowro7jy>wTov aafifiarov, or the first prime sabbath. 
The second, that is, when the day of pentecost fell on the 
sabbath, was called BevrepoTrpurov, which, he apprehends, was 
the sabbath here intended. * But as neither Grotius nor 
Hammond have produced any passage, in which either the 
word TzpioTOTTptDTov, or TpiTOTTpuTov, occurs, this interpretation 
remains doubtful and uncertain. Sir Isaac Newton imagines 
this (rafifiarov devTepoirpuyrov was the second great day of the 
feast of the passover : as we call Easter-day, high Easter, and 
its octave, low Easter, or Low Sunday ; so it seems St. Luke 
styles the feast, on the seventh day of the unleavened bread, 
the second of the two prime sabbaths.f To this sense Dr. 
Doddridge objects, that though the seventh day of unleavened 
bread was to be an holy convocation, yet the law expressly 
allowed the Jews to dress victuals on it, Exod. xii. 16; and 
therefore the Pharisees could have had no pretence for charg- 
ing Christ's disciples with breaking the sabbath by their pluck- 
ing and rubbing the ears of corn on that day, as they did ; 
Luke vi. 2. 

Theophylact,J who is followed by J. Scaliger,^ Lightfoot,|| 
and Whitby, makes the <raj3j3arov Sevrepoirpwrov to be the first 
of the seven sabbaths between the passover and pentecost, or 
the first sabbath after the second day of unleavened bread, 
from whence the fifty days to pentecost were computed ; 
Lev. xxiii. 15, 16. There want only instances of the word 
Be vrepoBevrepov being used for the second, and devTepoTpirov for 
the third of these sabbaths, to confirm this sense beyond dis- 
pute. However, though it be not quite free from uncertainty, 
it seems to stand as fair in point of probability as any of them.fl" 

* Grotii et Hammondi Annot. in loc. 

t Sir Isaac Newton's Observations on the Prophecies of Daniel and the 
Revelation, p. 154. 
X Comment, in loc. 

§ Scalig. de Emendat. Temp. lib. vi. p. 557, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1621, 
|| Lightfoot, Horse Hebraic, in loc. et in Matt. xii. %. 
1f See Whitby and Doddridge in loc. 



430 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 

Thus much for the word sabbath : we proceed to treat of the 
thing. 

It hath been controverted, both among Jews and Christians, 
whether the sabbath was first instituted immediately after the 
creation, and given to Adam and Eve in Paradise ; or whether 
the account of God's blessing the seventh day and sanctify- 
ing it, which Moses mentions in connexion with God's resting 
on the seventh day, when the work of creation was finished, 
Gen. ii. 3, is to be understood proleptically of his appointing 
that day to be observed as a sabbath, not at that time, but 
by the Israelites many ages afterward. 

Limborch,* Le Clerc,f and some other learned men, are 
of the latter opinion. But surely it is more natural to under- 
stand this passage as relating to the time in which it is placed 
in the series of the history, that is, to the first ages of the 
world, previous to the fall. The chief reason for understand- 
ing it proleptically is, that there is no mention of the sabbath 
afterward, in the sacred history, till the time of Moses, that 
is, for about two thousand five hundred years. However, the 
same argument will hardly be admitted in the case of circum- 
cision, of which there is no express mention in Scripture, or, 
however, no instance recorded of the observation of it, from 
the settlement of the Israelites in Canaan, to the circumcision 
of Christ. Nevertheless, as this rite was the sign of the cove- 
nant with Abraham and his posterity, and the characteristic 
of the peculiar people of God, its being constantly observed 
cannot reasonably be called in question, especially as the hea- 
then are called " the uncircumcised," in contradistinction to 
the Israelites, which implies, that it was practised constantly 
by the latter. The silence of history with respect to the con- 
tinuance of a rite or custom, well known to have been insti- 
tuted or adopted, is no argument against such continuance, 
provided the reason on which the institution was originally 
grounded, remains the same. It can by no means be con- 
cluded, that because there is no express mention of the observa- 
tion of a sabbath in the patriarchal history, therefore no sabbath 

* Limbore. Theolog. Christian, lib. v. cap. xxviii. sect. vii. — ix, p. 478, 
479, edit. Amstel. 1715. 

f Clerici Annot. in Gen, ii. 3. 



CHAP. III,] 



THE SABBATH. 



431 



was observed in those times. On the contrary, that the 
sabbath was instituted at the time to which Moses's relation 
of the institution of it refers, and was in consequence hereof 
observed by the patriarchs, is at least probable, from their 
distinguishing time by weeks of seven days, Gen. viii. 10 — 12; 
xxix. 27 ; for which it is not easy to account on any other 
supposition than of some positive divine appointment, there 
being no ground in nature for such a division. # The changes 
and quarters of the moon would not occasion it to be adopted, 
a lunar month being more than four times seven days, by 
above a day and a half. 

It is a farther confirmation of this argument, that all hea- 
then nations, many of whom cannot be supposed to have had 
any knowledge of the law or history of Moses, divided their 
time in the same manner as the patriarchs and the Jews did, 
by weeks of seven days. And it appears by their most 
ancient writers, Homer and Hesiod in particular, that they 
accounted one day of the seven more sacred than the rest. 
Hesiod styles the seventh day the illustrious light of the sun s 

''Efidofiarri 8' avSig \ctfi7rp0v (paog rjeXiow. 

Homer saith, 

'E(3So/jLa.Tr) d' riTTura KaTt]XvSrtv iepov rjfiap. 

Then came the seventh day, which is sacred or holy.f 

Now, can we suppose they should all agree in this division 
of time, unless from a divine institution imparted to our first 
parents, from whom it was derived by tradition to their pos- 
terity. 

Some have apprehended, as we have already observed, that 
" the end of the days," when Cain and Abel are said to have 
" brought their offerings to the Lord," Gen. iv. 3, means the 
end or last day of the week, that is, the sabbath day. But 
should this expression be thought to signify more probably the 
end of the year, when the fruits of the earth were ripe, it is 
not, however, unlikely that the day, when " the sons of God" 
are said in the book of Job to come to * present themselves 
before the Lord," chap. i. 6, was the sabbath, when pious per- 

* See a remarkable passage, to this purpose, of Johannes Philoponus, in 
Witsii iEgypt. lib. iii. cap. ix. sect. ii. p. 241, 242. 

f See Clemens Alexandrinus, Strom, lib. v. p. 600, edit. Paris, 1641 ; 
et Selden. de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. iii. cap. xvi. 



434 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK III. 



the manner of keeping the sabbath by a total cessation from 
labour, and the particular day on which it was to be kept by 
the Jews, seems to have been a new institution ; otherwise, 
as to the day, there would have been no occasion for its being 
so particularly marked out by Moses, as the reason of there 
being a double quantity of manna on the sixth day (see verses 
23. 25); for it must have immediately occurred to the people, 
that it was intended for their provision on the sabbath, if the 
next day had been the sabbath in course. And the expression 
which Moses useth is remarkable : " See," or take notice, " for 
that the Lord hath given you the sabbath" (as if this day were 
then first appointed to them), " therefore he giveth you on the 
sixth day the bread of two days;" ver. 29. And it seems to 
have been too trivial a circumstance to be recorded in the 
sacred history, that the people " rested on the seventh day," 
ver. 30, if this had been merely what they and their fathers 
had always done. 

It moreover appears, that that day week, before the day 
which was thus marked out for a sabbath by its not raining 
manna, was not observed as a sabbath. On the fifteenth day 
of the second month they journeyed from Elim, and came at 
night into the wilderness of Sin, ver. 1, where, on their mur- 
muring for want of provisions, the Lord that night sent them 
quails : and the next morning, which was the sixteenth day, it 
rained manna, and so for six days successively ; on the seventh, 
which was the twenty-second, it rained none, and that day 
they were commanded to keep for their sabbath ; and if this 
had been the sabbath in course, according to the paradisiacal 
computation, the fifteenth must have been so too, and would 
have been doubtless kept as a sabbath, and not have been any 
part of it spent in marching from Elim to Sin. 

Again, that the Jewish sabbath was on a different day from 
the paradisiacal is probable, from its being appointed as a sign 
between God and the people of Israel, by observing which 
they were to know or acknowledge Jehovah as their God : 
Exod. xxxi. 13. 17; Ezek. xx. 20. Agreeable to which is 
the opinion of the Jewish doctors, that the sabbath was given 
to the Israelites, and none else were bound to observe it. 
But how could it be a sign between God and the people of 
Israel, more than any other people, if it had been merely 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



435 



the old paradisiacal sabbath, which had been given to all 
mankind ? 

The Jewish sabbath being declared to be instituted as a 
memorial of their deliverance out of the land of Egypt, and 
this being superadded to the reason for keeping the ancient 
paradisiacal sabbath, makes it highly probable it was appointed 
to be on a different day ; otherwise, how could it be a memo- 
rial of a new event, or with what propriety could it be said, 
as it is, that because God " had brought them out of the land 
of Egypt, therefore he commanded them to keep the sabbath 
day?" Compare Exod. xx. 11, and Deut. v. 15. Some learned 
men have endeavoured to compute, that the Jewish sabbath 
was appointed on the same day of the week on which they 
left Egypt ; or rather, on which their deliverance was com- 
pleted by the overthrow of Pharoah in the Red Sea; but 
whether that computation can be clearly made out, or not, 
this new reason assigned for keeping the sabbath makes it 
very likely that it was so. 

To the foregoing arguments it is replied, 

1st. That the Israelites had probably lost the ancient sab- 
bath during their slavery in Egypt, if not before;* for that it 
cannot be thought their Egyptian taskmasters would suffer 
them to rest from their labours one day in every week ; and 
that therefore, the sabbath having been laid aside or forgot, 
the institution of the Jewish sabbath was only, by a new 
order, reviving the ancient sabbath. 

But to this it may be answered, That if the Israelites had 
forgot the original sabbath , God certainly had not ; and it is very 
improbable he would have commanded them to travel from 
Elim to Sin on the day he had consecrated to sacred rest, be- 
fore he had either repealed the law of the sabbath, or declared 
his will that any alteration should be made in it. For the 
children of Israel never journeyed, but at the command of 
God: Exod. xiii. 21; Numb. ix. 18. 

Again, it is not probable the Egyptians would be so blind 
to their own interest, as by subjecting the Israelites to ex- 
cessive and incessant labour, to wear out and destroy their 

* This was the opinion of Philo, de Vita Mosis, p. 491, E s edit. Colon. 
Allobr. 1613, 

2 f 2 



434 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK III. 



the manner of keeping the sabbath by a total cessation from 
labour, and the particular day on which it was to be kept by 
the Jews, seems to have been a new institution; otherwise, 
as to the day, there would have been no occasion for its being 
so particularly marked out by Moses, as the reason of there 
being a double quantity of manna on the sixth day (see verses 
23. 25); for it must have immediately occurred to the people, 
that it was intended for their provision on the sabbath, if the 
next day had been the sabbath in course. And the expression 
which Moses useth is remarkable : " See," or take notice, " for 
that the Lord hath given you the sabbath" (as if this day were 
then first appointed to them), " therefore he giveth you on the 
sixth day the bread of two days;" ver. 29. And it seems to 
have been too trivial a circumstance to be recorded in the 
sacred history, that the people " rested on the seventh day," 
ver. 30, if this had been merely what they and their fathers 
had always done. 

It moreover appears, that that day week, before the day 
which was thus marked out for a sabbath by its not raining 
manna, was not observed as a sabbath. On the fifteenth day 
of the second month they journeyed from Elim, and came at 
night into the wilderness of Sin, ver. 1, where, on their mur- 
muring for want of provisions, the Lord that night sent them 
quails : and the next morning, which was the sixteenth day, it 
rained manna, and so for six days successively ; on the seventh, 
which was the twenty-second, it rained none, and that day 
they were commanded to keep for their sabbath ; and if this 
had been the sabbath in course, according to the paradisiacal 
computation, the fifteenth must have been so too, and would 
have been doubtless kept as a sabbath, and not have been any 
part of it spent in marching from Elim to Sin. 

Again, that the Jewish sabbath was on a different day from 
the paradisiacal is probable, from its being appointed as a sign 
between God and the people of Israel, by observing which 
they were to know or acknowledge Jehovah as their God : 
Exod. xxxi. 13. 17; Ezek. xx. 20. Agreeable to which is 
the opinion of the Jewish doctors, that the sabbath was given 
to the Israelites, and none else were bound to observe it. 
But how could it be a sign between God and the people of 
Israel, more than any other people, if it had been merely 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



435 



the old paradisiacal sabbath, which had been given to all 
mankind 1 

The Jewish sabbath being declared to be instituted as a 
memorial of their deliverance out of the land of Egypt, and 
this being superadded to the reason for keeping the ancient 
paradisiacal sabbath, makes it highly probable it was appointed 
to be on a different day ; otherwise, how could it be a memo- 
rial of a new event, or with what propriety could it be said, 
as it is, that because God " had brought them out of the land 
of Egypt, therefore he commanded them to keep the sabbath 
day?" Compare Exod. xx. 11, and Deut. v. 15. Some learned 
men have endeavoured to compute, that the Jewish sabbath 
was appointed on the same day of the week on which they 
left Egypt ; or rather, on which their deliverance was com- 
pleted by the overthrow of Pharoah in the Red Sea; but 
whether that computation can be clearly made out, or not, 
this new reason assigned for keeping the sabbath makes it 
very likely that it was so. 

To the foregoing arguments it is replied, 

1st. That the Israelites had probably lost the ancient sab- 
bath during their slavery in Egypt, if not before;* for that it 
cannot be thought their Egyptian taskmasters would suffer 
them to rest from their labours one day in every week ; and 
that therefore, the sabbath having been laid aside or forgot, 
the institution of the Jewish sabbath was only, by a new 
order, reviving the ancient sabbath. 

But to this it may be answered, That if the Israelites had 
forgot the original sabbath, God certainly had not; and it is very 
improbable he would have commanded them to travel from 
Elim to Sin on the day he had consecrated to sacred rest, be- 
fore he had either repealed the law of the sabbath, or declared 
his will that any alteration should be made in it. For the 
children of Israel never journeyed, but at the command of 
God: Exod. xiii. 21; Numb. ix. 18. 

Again, it is not probable the Egyptians would be so blind 
to their own interest, as by subjecting the Israelites to ex- 
cessive and incessant labour, to wear out and destroy their 

* This was the opinion of Philo, de Vita Mosis, p. 491, E, edit. Colon, 
AUobr. 1613, 

2 F 2 



436 



JEWISH ANTIQLITIKS. 



[book ft I . 



constitutions,* It is more likely they allowed them a weekly 
day of rest, as is allowed by their masters to the negroes in 
the West Indies, more for the sake of their health, than out 
of any regard to religion. 

But if there is reason to believe, that the Egyptians them- 
selves observed the ancient paradisiacal sabbath, it is still 
more probable they would allow the Israelites to do the same; 
and as the Egyptians and other heathens received the law of 
the sabbath by tradition from Noah and Adam, it is reason- 
able to suppose they kept the day of the week originally ap- 
pointed; for what should alter it, as long as men measured 
their time by a regular succession of weeks, but a new divine 
institution ? 

It is a very probable conjecture, that the day which the 
heathens in general consecrated to the worship and honour of 
their chief god, the sun, which, according to our computation, 
was the first day of the week, was the ancient paradisiacal 
sabbath. What, but the tradition of a divine institution, 
should induce them to consecrate that day to their principal 
deity, and to esteem it more sacred than any other? 

The reason, perhaps, for God's changing the day might be 
to take off the Israelites more effectually from concurring with 
the Gentiles in their idolatrous worship of the sun. For the 
same reason, as the heathens begun their sabbath, and other 
days, from the sun-rising, the Israelites are ordered to begin 
their sabbaths from the sun-setting, Lev. xxiii. 32; " From 
evening to evening shall ye celebrate your sabbath." As the 
worshippers of the sun adored toward the east, the point of 
the sun's rising, God ordered the most holy place, in which 
were the sacred symbols of his presence in the tabernacle and 
temple, and toward which the people were to worship, to be 
placed to the west. 

2dly. It is objected, that the paradisiacal sabbath was ap- 
pointed to be kept on the seventh day ; and so, in the fourth 
commandment, was the Jewish ; and they are supposed, there- 
fore, to have been kept on the same day. But this conse- 
quence will not follow from the premises. It is by no means 
certain, that the seventh day of the Jewish week coincided 

* See Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. iii. cap, xiii. Oper. vol. i. torn. i. 
p. 344. 



'"HAP. III.] 



The sabbath. 



437 



with the seventh of the paradisiacal. For, upon their migra- 
tion out of Egypt, God appointed the Israelites a quite new 
computation of time. The beginning of the year was changed 
from the month Tizri to the opposite month Abib, Exod. xii. 
2; and the beginning of the day from the morning to the 
evening ; for whereas the fifteenth day of the month, on which 
they departed from Egypt, was reckoned to be the morrow 
after the evening in which they eat the passover, that is, on 
the fourteenth day (Numb, xxxiii. 3, compared with Exod. xii. 
6), they were, for the time to come, to compute their days, at 
least their sabbaths, from evening to evening : by this means 
the fifteenth day was changed into the fourteenth, and the 
seventh into the sixth ; and the change of the sabbath made 
a change likewise of the beginning of the week, it always be- 
ginning the next day after the sabbath, which was still the 
seventh day of the week, or the seventh in respect of the pre- 
ceding six of labour, though not the seventh from the begin- 
ning of time. 

We may farther observe, that the law of the sabbath is 
limited, not only to the people of Israel, but to the duration 
of their state and polity. " Thy children shall observe the 
sabbath throughout their generations," Exod. xxxi. 16; that 
is, as long as their political constitution should endure, to the 
days of the Messiah, so long the sabbath was to be kept for 
a " perpetual covenant," without interruption, and was to be 
" a sign between God and the children of Israel for ever," ver. 
17, or while they were his peculiar people, and only visible 
church in the world. In the same sense the priesthood of 
Aaron and his sons is called an everlasting priesthood, chap. 
3iL 15; and God promised that he would give to the seed of 
Abraham all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession ; 
Gen. xvii. 8. 

This law, or institution of the sabbath, was enforced by the 
threatening of capital punishment to such as violated it: 
" Every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death; and 
whoever doth any work thereon, that soul shall surely be cut 
off from among his people;" Exod. xxxi. 14. These two 
clauses of the threatening are generally understood in the fol- 
lowing manner : " The first, as referring to any open violation 



438 



JEWISH A H T IQ L IT J ES. 



[BOOK 111. 



of the sabbath; which was to be punished by the magistrate 
with death, but it was not yet declared by what kind of death. 
Accordingly, a person being afterward convicted of this crime, 
he was put in ward, " because it was not declared what should 
be done to him;" Numb. xv. 34. And God being afresh 
consulted on this occasion, it was now determined the execu- 
tion for this offence should be by stoning; ver. 35. The 
second clause of the threatening, " that soul should be cut off 
from among his people," is commonly supposed to relate to 
secret violations of the sabbath, of which there being no wit- 
nesses, they could not be punished by the magistrate; and 
therefore they should be punished by the immediate hand of 
God. The same phrase is used concerning the punishment 
of incestuous and unlawful conjunctions, which are generally 
practised secretly, and therefore can be punished by none but 
God ; see Lev. xviii. 29. 

Thus much for the institution of the Jewish sabbath. We 
now proceed, 

Secondly, To consider the duties that belonged to it ; which 
are, to remember to keep it holy, to abstain from all work and 
worldly business on that day, and to sanctify it. 

The first duty of the sabbath is to remember to keep it holy, 
Exod. xx. 8, which may import two things : 

1st. The commemoration of blessings formerly received; 
and, 

2dly. Preparing themselves for the due observance of it. 

1st. The word " remember'' hath naturally a retrospect to 
those former blessings which they were particularly to recollect 
and commemorate on the sabbath. And they were chiefly 
two, — God's creating the world, and his delivering their nation 
from bondage in Egypt. The first was a blessing common 
to the Jews and the rest of mankind ; and is accordingly as- 
signed as the reason of God's appointing a sabbath to be kept 
by Adam and all his posterity ; Gen. ii. 3. This reason, there- 
fore, for the observation of the sabbath was not peculiar to the 
Jews, but common to them and all others, on whatever day it 
was kept. But besides this reason mentioned in the book of 
Exodus, on occasion of the institution of the Jewish sabbath, 
chap. xx. 11, there was a farther reason assigned in the book 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



439 



of Deuteronomy, chap. v. 15, which was peculiar to them- 
selves, namely, their deliverance from their bondage in the 
land of Egypt. 

2dly. To " remember the sabbath to keep it holy," may 
farther imply, that they should not forget to prepare themselves 
beforehand for the right observance of it. The sabbath began 
at six, the preparation at three o'clock in the afternoon, and 
then they got every thing in readiness, for which they had 
occasion, and the procuring or providing which was prohibited 
on the sabbath, or inconsistent with the strictness which the 
law required on that holy day. The whole preceding day, 
according to Godwin, was a kind of preparation, which, saith 
he, will appear by the particulars then forbidden : First, on 
this day they might go no more than three parsas, ten of which 
a man might go in an ordinary day : Secondly, judges might 
not sit in judgment upon life and death : Thirdly, all sorts 
of artificers were forbidden to work, three only accepted, 
shoemakers, tailors, and scribes, who were allowed to employ 
themselves during half the time allotted for preparation, the 
two former in repairing apparel, the last in getting ready to 
expound the law.* 

It was usual to give notice of the approach of the sabbath, 
by blowing the trumpet from some high place .f Rhenferd 
concludes, that the rQ£TT "JDIft mussak hassabath, or, as our 
version renders it, the covert for the sabbath, which king 
Ahaz took away from the temple, 2 Kings xvi. 18, was some 
kind of watch-tower, from the top of which the priests used 
to proclaim in this manner the approach of the sabbath.^ But 
it may as well signify a canopy, under which the king u.sed to 
sit in the court or porch of the temple on the sabbath-day, 
which Ahaz probably took away, to express his contempt of 
the sabbath, and his not intending to come to the temple any 
more. 

The second duty of the sabbath was to abstain from all 
manner of work or business; from the labour of their trades 

* Concerning the preparation for the sabbath, see Buxtorfii Synag. Judaic, 
cap. xv. 

t Maimon. in Tract. Sabbath, cap. v. sect, xviii. xix. • Leusden. Philolog. 
Hebraeo-mixt. dissert, xxxvi. sub fin. 

% Vid. Rhenferd. opus Philolog. dissert, xviii. 



440 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111 



and callings, Exod. xxxi. 15; buying and selling, Nehem. x. 
31; carrying burdens, Jer. xvii. 21; and travelling. The 
law enjoins, that " no man should go out of his place on the 
sabbath-day/' Exod. xvi. 29, which could not be meant to 
confine them to their houses, since the sabbath was to be cele- 
brated by a holy convocation, Lev. xxiii. 3, or by the people's 
assembling for public worship. It can only, therefore, be un- 
derstood as forbidding them to travel any farther than was ne- 
cessary for that purpose ; how far that might be, the law does 
not determine, but leaves it to every one's discretion, accord- 
ing as the synagogue or place of worship, when the Jews 
came to be settled in Canaan, might be nearer or more re- 
mote. But the rabbies, the expounders of the law, have fixed 
it at two thousand cubits,* or about two-thirds of an English 
mile. This they ground, partly on Joshua's appointing the 
space of two thousand cubits between the ark and the people, 
when they marched into Canaan, Josh. iii. 4, and partly, on 
two thousand cubits being assigned for the suburbs of the 
cities of the Levites all around them, ]N"umb. xxxv. 5; beyond 
which, say they, it was not lawful for them to travel on the 
sabbath-day. The Chaldee Paraphrase, on Ruth i. 16, says, 
" Naomi said unto Ruth, we are commanded to keep the 
sabbath and good days, and not to go above two thousand 
cubits. " The same measure is assigned in the Babylonish 
Talmud.f This, in all probability, was the distance of Mount 
Olivet from Jerusalem, it being said, Acts i. 12, to be a sab- 
bath-day's journey .J 

Again, the Jews were forbid " doing and finding their own 
pleasure on the sabbath;" which, I conceive, is to be under- 
stood of recreations and diversions ; and " speaking their own 
words," that is, talking about worldly matters, making bar- 
gains, &c. ; Isa. lviii. 13. 

They were likewise forbid kindling fires in their habitations 

* Vid. Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis Diebus Hebrseor. part ii. cap. ix. 
sect, xxxix. xl. p. 188. 190; Hottinger. Juris Hebraeor. Leges, leg. xxiv. 
p. 32 — 34; Lightfoot, Horae Hebraic, in Luc. xxiv. 50, et Act. x. 12. 

t Cod. Gnerubin, fol. 48, 1, et fol. 51, 1 ; Vid. Meyer. Hottinger. et 
Lightfoot, ubi supra. 

\ See Voightii Dissert, de Via Sabbathi ; et Waltheri Dissert, de Itmere 
Sabbathi, in Act. i. 12, apud Thesaur. Theolog. Philolog. torn, ii, p. 417, et 
seq< p. 423, et seq. Amstel. 1702. 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



441 



on the sabbath-day ; Exod. xxxv. 3. This law, it is supposed, 
was not intended to prohibit their having fires on the sabbath, 
to keep them warm in cold weather, but only to dress their 
meat, or for any other work. They were to dress their 
victuals for the sabbath the day before, that no servile labour, 
or as little as possible, might be done on the day itself, and 
that their servants might rest as well as themselves ; chap. xvi. 
23. Nay, the sabbatical rest was ordered to extend even to 
the beasts of labour ; they were not to be set to work on that 
day; chap. xx. 10. The ancient doctors inculcated the rest 
of the sabbath with a very superstitious rigour, forbidding even 
all acts of self-defence on that day, though assaulted by their 
enemies. Upon this principle a thousand Jews suffered them- 
selves to be slain on the sabbath, not making the least resistance, 
in the beginning of the Maccabean wars;* 1 Mac. ii. 31 — 38. 
Upon which Mattathias and his followers reflecting, that if 
they went on to act upon this principle, they must all be de- 
stroyed in like manner, decreed, upon a full debate of the matter, 
that for the future, if they were assaulted on the sabbath, they 
should defend themselves, and it was lawful for them so to do ; 
ver. 39 — 41 .f However, though they would defend themselves 
against a direct attack, they would do nothing to hinder the 
enemy's works ; which Pompey observing, as he was besieg- 
ing Jerusalem in favour of Hyrcanus against his brother Aris- 
tobulus, ordered that no assault should be made on the sab- 
bath, but that the day should be employed by his army in car- 
rying on their works, such as filling up the ditches with which 
the temple was fortified, placing their battering engines, &c, 
by which means he took the city, and brought the Jews under 
subjection to the Romans, who at length took away both their 
place and nation. J Thus their traditionary precepts, by which 
in many cases they made void the law of God, proved, in the 
end, to be one means of their utter destruction. 

Nevertheless, the modern or rabbinical doctors have re- 
garded the rest of the sabbath, if possible, more superstitiously 
still: they advance thirty-nine negative precepts concerning 

* Joseph, lib. xii. cap. vi. sect. ii. p. 612, edit. Haverc. 
f Joseph, ubi supra, et sect. iii. 

X Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiv. cap. iv. sect. ii. — iv. p. 689 ; see the story in 
Prideaux's Connect, part ii. book vi. sub anno 63, vol. iv. p. 620, 621. 



442 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



things not to be done on that day, besides many others which 
are appendages to them. Two of these may serve as a speci- 
men of the whole : grass might not be walked upon, lest it 
should be bruised, which is a sort of threshing : and a flea 
must not be caught, while it hops about, because that is a kind 
of hunting. They acquaint us also with many positive precepts 
which run much in the same strain ; that they should put on 
clean linen, wear better clothes than on any other day, eat 
once in six hours,* &c. But the true key for understanding 
the law of God concerning the sabbatical rest was given us 
by our Saviour, when he said, " The sabbath was made for 
man, and not man for the sabbath," Mark ii. 27 : it was in- 
tended for his benefit, for his rest and religious improvement, 
and not as a yoke of bondage, restraining him from works of 
necessity or mercy. And this leads to the consideration of 

The third duty of the sabbath, which is, to " sanctify it;" 
Deut. v. 12. It is inquired what this means? Some would 
have it to import no more than abstaining from work and la- 
bour. Le Clerc contends for this opinion, and alleges in sup- 
port of it, the following passage of Jeremiah : " Neither carry 
forth a burden out of your houses on the sabbath-day, neither 
do ye any work ; but hallow ye the sabbath-day, as I com- 
manded your fathers chap. xvii. 22. 24. Doing no work on 
the sabbath, and hallowing or sanctifying it, are plainly used 
as expressions of the same import. As for what is called in 
Leviticus ** the holy convocation to be kept on the sabbath," 
chap, xxiii. 3, he supposes it means what the Greeks call 
7ravriyvpig, an assembly for feasting and pleasure. f Vitringa 
espouses the same sentiment.^: The Jewish doctors are of a 
contrary opinion ; they make the sanctification of the sabbath 
to consist, not merely in rest and idleness, but in meditation 
on the wonderful works of God, in the study of the law, and 

* Minister, in Exod. xx. 2; Mishn. torn. ii. tit. Sabbath; Maimon. tract. 
Sabbath, passim ; Leusden. Philolog. Hebrseo-mixt. dissert, xxxiv. xxxv. de 
Sabbatho, prsesertim, sect. vi. p. 235, 2d edit.; and Buxtorf. de Synag. 
Judaic, cap. xv. p. 322, cap. xvi. p. 351 — 364, edit Basil. 1661. 

f Clerici Comment, in Exod. xx. 8. 

I De Synag. Vetere, lib. i. part ii. cap. ii. especially p. 289 — 294. 
Spencer maintains the same opinion, De Legibus Hebrreor. lib. i. cap. v. 
sect viii. — x. vol. i. p. 67 — 88, edit. Cantab. 1727. 



CHAP. Ill .] 



THE SABBATH. 



443 



in instructing those who are under them.* They tell us far- 
ther, that the ninety-second Psalm was composed by Adam 
for the devotion of this day.f We shall not insist on the last 
particular; in other respects their opinion seems to be agree- 
able to Scripture and the reason of things, because, 

1st. The word sanctify, applied either to persons or things, 
usually imports not only the separation of them from common 
use, but the dedication of them to the more immediate service 
of God. To sanctify the sabbath, therefore, according to the 
true import of the word, is not only to refrain from common 
business, but to spend the day in the peculiar service of God, 
or in religious exercises and acts of devotion. 

2dly. Double sacrifices being appointed to be offered on 
the sabbath, Numb, xxviii. 9, 10, is an intimation that it was 
intended to be a day of extraordinary devotion. 

3dly. The ttnp smpD mikre kodhesh, or holy convocations 
to be held on the sabbath, Lev. xxiii. 3, are most na- 
turally to be understood of assemblies for religious worship j 
as in the following passage of Isaiah : " The Lord will create 
upon every dwelling-place of Mount Zion, and upon her as- 
semblies, ttHp **npD mikre kodhesh, a cloud and smoke by 
day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night ;" chap.iv. 5.J 

4thly. That such religious assemblies were anciently held 
on the sabbath is argued from the Shunamite's husband in- 
quiring of her why she wanted to go to the prophet's house, 
when it was neither new moon nor sabbath ? 2 Kings iv. 23. 
Which seems to imply, that it was customary to go to his 
house on sabbath-days ; and it may reasonably be supposed to 
be for the sake of religious worship performed there, when pro- 
bably the prophet preached for the instruction of the people. 

This may likewise be inferred with great probability from 
the following passage of the Acts : " Moses, of old time,§ 
hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the 
synagogues every sabbath-day ;" chap. xv. 21. 

* Vid. Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis, part ii. cap. ix. sect. lx. et seq. 
p. 197, &c; Christoph. Cartwright. Electa Targum. Rabbin. inExod.xx.8. 
f See the title of this Psalm in the Chaldee Paraphrase. 
\ See above, p. 365. 

§ Tevto)v apxaiwv, from ancient generations, or the first ages. Vid. Marckn 
Syllog. Dissertat, Philolog. Theolog. exercitat. xvi. sect. vii. p. 454, 455, 
Rotterod. 1721. 



444 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



5thly. We may argue, with Manasseh Ben-Israel, that, as 
idleness is usually productive of a great deal of evil, if the 
institution of the sabbath had been merely to render people 
idle one day in the week, it would have been very hurtful 
instead of beneficial. # 

Upon the whole, we conclude, that the sabbath was to be 
sanctified by acts of devotion, and especially by meeting to- 
gether in solemn assemblies for public worship. Of this opi- 
nion is Josephus, who mentions it as an excellent institution 
of Moses, that, not thinking it sufficient for the Israelites to 
hear the law once or twice, or oftener, he commanded them 
every week to lay aside all worldly business, and to assemble 
in public to hear the law read and expounded .f Philo saith 
much the same thing. J 

Thirdly. In the last place we are to consider the ends for 
which the sabbath was instituted, which were partly political 
and partly religious. 

1st. There is a political end assigned for this institution ; 
namely, that the beasts of burden, as well as servants and 
other labouring people, might be refreshed by resting one day 
in seven, which would be a means of recruiting their vigour 
and preserving their health : " That thine ox and thine ass 
may rest, and the son of thy handmaid and the stranger may 
be refreshed;" Exod. xxiii. 12. Some of the Jewish doctors, 
by the servants that were to rest on the sabbath-day, under- 
stand only such as were circumcised. Uncircumcised slaves, 
they say, might w r ork on the sabbath, as an Israelite might on 
any other day.§ Whereas the weekly rest, extending to the 
labouring beast, surely much more included all labouring ser- 
vants, of whatever religious denomination. By the way, this 
may suggest a good reason why the civil magistrate, whose 
province is not religion, but merely the civil weal, should 
nevertheless maintain the observation of the sabbath, because 

* Manass. Conciliat. in Exod. quaest. xxxv. See the passage at large in 
Cartwright, ubi supra. 

t Joseph, contra Appion. lib. ii. sect. xvii. p. 483 ; see also, Antiq. lib. 
xvi. cap. ii. sect. iv. p. 788, edit. Haverc. 

t Philo in Vit. Mosis, lib. in. p. 529, 530, edit. Colon. Ailobr. 1613. 

§ Maimon. de Sabbato, cap. xx. sect. xiv. See Ainsworth on Exod. 
xx. 10. 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



445 



a weekly day of rest is evidently conducive to the civil and 
national welfare. 

2dly. The religious reason for this institution was twofold ; 
partly to keep up a thankful remembrance of blessings already 
received, and partly to be a means of their obtaining and en- 
joying future and heavenly blessings. 

The blessings already received, of which the sabbath was 
instituted to be a memorial, were chiefly two, — their creation, 
and their deliverance from bondage in Egypt. 

1st. It was appointed to be kept in memory of God's 
creating the world, which is the reason assigned for the first 
institution, Gen. ii. 2, 3, because " on the seventh day God 
ended his work, which he had made," or, as the word *?0M 
vaichal should rather be rendered, " he had ended his work," 
for he did not work on the seventh day ; it follows, " he 
rested on the seventh day from all his works which he had 
made, and blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, because 
that in it he had rested from all his work." This, however, 
is not to be understood of his ceasing from any farther opera- 
tion and action, the contrary to which our Saviour asserts: 
" My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," John v. 17 ; that 
is, in preserving, ordering, and governing the world. It is 
therefore commonly understood to mean, that he ceased from 
creating any new sorts or species of creatures ; so that his 
power has ever since been exerted only in continuing and 
increasing the several species which he formed on the first 
six days. And certain it is, no instance can be given of any 
new sort or species having been since brought into being. 
Though various kinds of mules have been produced by crea- 
tures of different species, both in the animal and vegetable 
world, yet such are not to be reckoned distinct species, since 
none of them ever propagate their kind. 

As for God's resting, we are not to understand it as op- 
posed to toil or weariness ■ for " the Creator of the ends of 
the earth fainteth not, -neither is weary ;" Isa. xl. 28. But it 
merely imports his ceasing to work as he had done for the 
preceding six days. Thus the word rottf shabath is used for 
the manna's ceasing to fall, Josh. v. 12, and for the Israelites 
ceasing to be a nation ; Jer. xxxi. 36. Nevertheless, it may 
probably import likewise, the complacency or delight which 



446 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book hi. 



he took in the works he had made, which were " all very 
good since, in the twentieth chapter of Exodus, God's 
resting on the seventh day is expressed by the verb rro nuach, 
ver. 11; the same word which is used for his acceptance 
of Noah's sacrifice; "The Lord smelt a savour of rest," or, 
as we render it, " a sweet savour/' Gen. viii. 21 ; importing, 
that his thankfulness and devotion, expressed by his sacrifice, 
were as grateful to God as sweet odours are to us. To pre- 
serve, therefore, a remembrance of his creating the world in 
six days, and his resting from his work on the seventh, God 
instituted a weekly sabbath, commanding men to work six 
days, and to lay aside all their worldly employments on the 
seventh. And no doubt the right remembrance of God's 
creating power, wisdom, and goodness, must include adora- 
tion, thankfulness, and praise to the great Creator. 

2dly. The other blessing, which the Jews in particular were 
to commemorate, was their deliverance out of the Egyptian 
bondage ; which is mentioned as the special reason of their 
being commanded to keep the sabbath ; Deut. v. 15. The 
learned Mr. Mede endeavours to prove the seventh day of the 
Jewish week, which was appointed for the sabbath, to be the 
day on which God overthrew Pharaoh in the Red Sea, and 
thereby completed the deliverance of his people from the 
Egyptian servitude. And whereas a seventh day had before 
been kept in memory of the creation (but to what day of the 
Jewish week that answered we cannot certainly say), now God 
commanded them to observe for the future this day of their 
deliverance, which was the seventh day of their week, in 
commemoration of his having given them rest from their hard 
labour and servitude in Egypt.* And both these reasons for 
their observing the sabbath implied their obligation to observe 
it with devotion, gratitude, and praise. 

The other religious end of the sabbath was to be a means 
of their obtaining and enjoying future and heavenly blessings. 
This is a principal design of all acts of devotion and worship ; 
such as we have already shown ought to accompany the ob- 
servance of the sabbath. The Jews accounted this holy day 
to be a type of the heavenly rest. On this notion the apostle 
evidently grounds his discourse in the fourth chapter of the 
* Mede's Diatrib on Ezek. xx. 10c 



CHAP. III.] 



THE SABBATH. 



447 



Epistle to the Hebrews, ver. 1 — 11. Origen makes the sab- 
bath an emblem of that rest we shall enjoy when we have 
done our work, so as to have left nothing undone which was 
our incumbent duty. # In the same manner the Jewish doc- 
tors speak of the sabbath. It was a common proverb among 
them,f te Non datum est sabbatum, nisi ut esset typus futuri 
seculi." Remarkable to the same purpose are the words of 
Abarbanei : % " Sabbata dixit in plurali numero, quandoquidem 
praeceptum de sabbato non solum designat fundamentalem 
ilium articulum de creatione mundi, verum etiam, mundum 
spiritualem, in quo erit vera quies, et vera possessio. Illic 
vera cessatio erit, ab omnibus operibus et rebus corporeis. 
Habemus ergo duo sabbata, unum corporale, in memoriam 
creationis, alterum spirituale, in memoriam immortalitatis 
animas et oblectationis post mortem." The Jews, therefore, 
by no means count the sabbath a burden, but a great bless- 
ing : they have it in high veneration, and affect to call it their 
spouse. § Leo of Modena tells us, that so far are the modern 
Jews from being inclined to shorten the sabbath, that they 
make it last as long as possible, prolonging their hymns and 
prayers, not only out of devotion to God, but charity to the 
souls of the damned, it being a received opinion among them, 
that they suffer no torments on the sabbath. || 

* Origen. contra Celsum, lib. vi. p. 317, edit. Spencer. Cantab. 1677, 
f Vid. Buxtorf. Florileg. Hebr. p. 299. 
| On Exod. xxxi. 13. 

§ Selden. de Jure Nat. et Gent. lib. iii. cap. x. Oper. vol. i. p. 326, 327 ; 
Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xv. p. 299, 300, edit. Basil. 1661. 

|| On the subject of the sabbath, consult Selden, de Jure Nat. et Gent, 
lib. iii. cap. viii. et seq.; Capelli Disputatio de Sabbatho, apud Comment, 
et Not. Critic, in Vet. Test. p. 263, et seq. Amstel. 1689 ; Spencer, de Leg, 
Hebr. lib. i. cap. v. sect. vii. et seq. 



CHAPTER IV. 



OF THE PASSOVER AND FEAST OF UNLEAVENED 
BREAD. 

The Jewish festivals were either weekly, as the sabbath ; 
monthly, as the new moons ; or annual, as the passover, the 
pentecost, the feast of ingathering or of tabernacles, and the 
feast of trumpets ; to which we may add the annual fast, or 
day of expiation. Besides these, there were others that 
returned once in a certain number of years ; as the sabbatical 
year, and the jubilee. 

Of the anniversary feasts, the three former were the most 
considerable, the passover, the pentecost, and the feast of 
tabernacles. At each of these all the males were to appear 
before the Lord at the national altar: Exod. xxiii. 14. 17; 
xxxiv. 22, 23 ; Deut. xvi. 16. The design of this was, partly, 
to unite the Jews among themselves, and to promote mutual 
love and friendship throughout the nation, by means of the 
whole body of them meeting together so often : to which 
the Psalmist seems to refer, when he saith, " Jerusalem is 
builded as a city that is compact together : whither the 
tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of 
Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord Psalm 
cxxii. 3, 4. And it was, partly, that as one church they might 
make one congregation, and join in solemn worship together ; 
for I apprehend the Scripture idea of one particular church is 
only one worshipping assembly. And it was farther, by so 
large an appearance and concourse of people, to grace these 
sacred festivals, and add greater solemnity to the worship ; 
and, partly, likewise, for the better support of the service and 
ministers of the sanctuary ; for none were to appear before 
the Lord empty, each person was to bring some gift or present 
with him, according to his ability, and as God had blessed 
him; Deut. xvi. 16, 17. Farther, as the Jewish sanctuary 
and service contained in them a shadow of good things to 



CHAP IV.] 



ANNUAL FEASTS. 



449 



come, and were typical of the gospel church, this prescribed 
concourse from all parts of the country to the sanctuary might 
be intended to typify the gathering of the people to Christ, 
and into his church, from all parts of the world, under the 
Christian dispensation. Hence the apostle, in allusion to 
these general assemblies of the Israelites on the three grand 
feasts, saith, " We are come to the general assembly and 
church of the first-born;" Heb. xii. 23. 

The law required only the males to appear before the Lord 
on these solemn occasions. But, though the women were 
exempted from a necessity of attending, yet they were not 
excluded if they pleased to do it, and could with convenience ; 
as appears from the case of Hannah, who used to go with her 
husband yearly to worship and sacrifice to the Lord of Hosts 
in Shiloh, 1 Sam. i. 3. 7; and from the case of the Virgin 
Mary, who went with her husband Joseph every year at the 
feast of the passover to Jerusalem; Luke ii. 41. Mr. Mede 
assigns three reasons for the women's being exempted from 
the duty of attending the feasts: — 

1st. The weakness and infirmity of the sex, they not being 
able, without much trouble and danger, to undertake so long 
a journey from the remote parts of the country. 

2dly. The hazard of their chastity in so vast a concourse 
of people. 

3dly. The care of their young children, and other house- 
hold affairs, which must have been wholly abandoned if they, 
as well as the men, had been absent from their houses so long 
at the same time. # 

To these reasons probably another and more considerable 
maybe added, namely, the legal uncleannesses to which they 
would be liable in so long a journey. 

Though the law required all the males to appear before the 
Lord, in the place he should choose, at these three feasts; no 
doubt it was to be understood with some restriction, it not 
being likely that young children or decrepit old men could 
give their attendance.^ Mr. MedeJ conceives the law is to 

* Mede's Diatrib. discourse xlvii. on Deut. xvi. 16, Works, p. 261. 
f These, among others, are expressly excepted, Mishn. tit. Chagigah, 
cap. i. sect. i. torn. ii. p. 413, edit. Surenhus.; see also the Gemara in loc. 
I Mede, ubi supra. 

2 G 



450 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK HI. 



be understood of all males within the age of service from 
twenty to fifty years old ; for at fifty all were emeriti, even 
the priests and Levites serve not after that age : but as to the 
age at which persons entered on service, that was different; 
the priests might not serve before thirty, nor the Levites 
before twenty-five; but the laity were capable of employment 
at twenty, as appears from a passage in Numbers, where God 
commands Moses " to take the sum of all the congregation of 
the children of Israel, from twenty years old and upwards, all 
that were able to go forth to war;" Numb. i. 3. But if, ac- 
cording to the rabbies, children came under the obligation of 
the law when they were twelve years old, this perhaps was the 
age of their attendance at these festivals: which opinion is 
somewhat countenanced by the history of Jesus going with his 
parents to Jerusalem at the passover when he was twelve years 
old; Luke ii. 42.* But I take the more probable opinion to 
be, that a ll the males meant all that were capable of taking the 
journeyf and of attending the feast, which some were able to 
do sooner and some later in life; and therefore by the law no 
age was fixed, but it was left to be determined by every one's 
prudence and religious zeal; only none might absent them- 
selves without sufficient reason. 

There are yet two difficulties, which have been started con- 
cerning this law. One is, how Jerusalem could contain such 
multitudes as flocked from all parts of Judea to these solemni- 
ties. The other is, how the Israelites could leave their towns 
and villages destitute of men, without the greatest danger of 
being invaded and plundered by their neighbouring enemies. 

As to the former question, it may as well be asked, how it 
is possible for Bath and Tunbridge to contain such multitudes 
as flock to them in their seasons. For, as at those places 
there are great numbers of lodging-houses, much larger than 
are requisite for the accommodation of the families that con- 
stantly inhabit them ; so it was doubtless at Jerusalem, to 
which there were every year three stated seasons of concourse 
from all parts of the country. It is probable, that most fami- 
lies let lodgings at those times. The man at whose house 
our Saviour eat his last passover with his disciples, had a 
" guest-chamber," or a room which he spared on these occa- 

* Lightfoot, Hor. Hebraic, in loc. f Yid. Mislin. ubi supra. 



CHAP. IV.] 



ANNUAL FEASTS. 



451 



sjions; Luke xxii. 11. Or if this be not sufficient to remove 
the difficulty, it is an easy supposition, that many might be 
entertained in tents erected on these occasions ; as the Mo- 
hammedan pilgrims are at Mecca, to which many thousands 
resort at a certain time of the year. 

As to the other difficulty, concerning the danger of leaving 
their towns and villages without any men to guard them, we 
need not have recourse to the conjecture advanced by some, 
that this obligation on all the males was only during their 
abode in the wilderness, when their nearness to the tabernacle 
easily admitted of their attendance. If that had been the 
case, Jeroboam need not have set up the golden calves at 
Dan and Bethel, to deliver the ten tribes from going up to 
Jerusalem to worship; 1 Kings xii. 27, 28. Beside, there 
are sufficient instances in the Jewish history to show, that this 
practice was continued till after our Saviour's time. Thus we 
are informed in the Acts, that there were multitudes of Jews, 
out of every nation under heaven, come to Jerusalem at the 
feast of pentecost; chap. ii. 5. KaroiKowTEg , which our ver- 
sion renders " dwelling" at Jerusalem, should in this place 
be rendered " abiding," that is, during the time of the festival. 
KaroiKriGLq is used by St. Mark for a place of transient abode, 
and not a fixed and settled habitation; chap. v. 3. 

Nor need we suppose with others, that they only sent a 
certain proportion of men, as one in ten or twelve, to Jeru- 
salem, to be as it were the representatives, and offer the 
gifts of the rest, while they kept the feasts in their own 
towns. Nor need we, again, suppose with others, that 
since there was a divine permission granted to those who 
were unable to celebrate the passover in the first month, to 
do it in the second, Numb. ix. 10, 11, the same indulgence 
might probably extend to the other festivals ; and so one half 
of the males might stay at home and guard the country and 
their houses, while the other half went to the sanctuary; and 
those who thus remained behind might celebrate the festival 
in the next month. 

We need, I say, none of these suppositions and conjectures, 
since God himself had expressly undertaken to guard their 
habitations and substance, by his special providence, while 
the men were absent to celebrate the sacred festivals: w Nei= 

2 g 2 



462 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 



ther shall any man desire thy land," it is said, **■ when thou 
shalt go up to appear, befor the Lord thy God thrice in the 
year;" Exod. xxxiv. 24. This is, by the way, a very re- 
markable instance of the sovereign and absolute power which 
God exercises over the hearts and spirits of men. Accord- 
ingly, we find not in Jhe whole Scripture history, that any such 
evil ever befel the Israelites on these occasions; insomuch 
that though in many other cases they were backward in be- 
lieving God's promises; yet, at these seasons, they would 
leave their habitations and families without the least appre- 
hension of danger. 

Having thus considered a circumstance which was com- 
mon to the three grand anniversary feasts, we are now to 
treat of the first of them, namely, the passover. 

Of the institution of this festival we have an account in the 
twelfth chapter of the book of Exodus. It is called in the 
Hebrew NflPD pascha, from nPD pasach, transiit. In the 
Greek it is called icaaya, but not from the verb Ttaayh), pallor, 
to suffer, on account of Christ's havino- suffered at the time of 
this feast, according to the illiterate supposition of Chrysos- 
tom, Irenseus, and Tertullian. Chrysostom saith, Yiaa\a 
XsysTai, on tots E7ra6sv 6 XpiGTog vTTsp '. " Pascha dicitur, 
quia Christus illo tempore pro nobis passus est."* Irenaeus 
saith, " A Moyse ostenditur Filius Dei, cujus et diem pas- 
sionis non ignoravit, sed figuratim pronunciavit, eum pascha 

nominans."f Tertullian, " Hanc solemnitatem praecane- 

bat (sc. Moyses) et adjecit, Pascha esse Domini, id est, 
passionem Christi."^ But the Greek word Traaya is derived 
from the Chaldee NI7PD pascha,% which answers to the He- 
brew flPD pesach ; and the festival was so called, not from 
its being prophetical or typical of Christ's sufferings, but from 
God's passing over and leaving in safety the houses of the 
Israelites, on the door-posts of which the blood of the sacri- 

* Homil. v. in 1 Tim. 

f Iren. adversus Hoer. lib, iv. cap. xxiii. p. 309, edit. Grabii, Oxon. 
1702. 

X Tertullian adversus Judaeos, cap. x. sub. fin. p. 197, A, edit. Rigalt. 
Paris, 1675. 

§ Philo in Vita Mosis, lib. iii. p. 531, A, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613, 
to x a ^ aL<7Tl ^zyopevov -n-aaxa- In his treatise De Decalogo, he saith, ?/v (sc. 
topTrjv) 'E^pajot irarpuo y\o)TTy TraG^a 7rpo<?ayopivovcnv> p. 591, C. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



453 



need lamb was sprinkled, when he slew the first-born in all 
the houses of the Egyptians. This etymology of the name is 
expressly given in the book of Exodus : " It is the sacrifice of 
the Lord's passover," nPD asher pasach, who passed by, 
or leaped over, the houses of the Israelites; chap. xii. 27. 
So that our English word passover well expresses the true 
import of the original HDD pesach, or KflDD pascha.. 

Concerning the passover we shall consider, 

1st. The time when it was to be kept: 

2dly. The rites with which it was to be celebrated : 

3dly. The signification of these rites. 

First. The time when this feast was to be celebrated, is 
very particularly expressed in Leviticus, " in the fourteenth 
day of the first month, at even, is the Lord's passover," chap, 
xxiii. 5; wherein is remarked the month, the day, and the 
time of the day. 

1st. The month. It is called the first month, that is, of 
the ecclesiastical year, which commenced with the Israelites' 
nigh tout of Egypt ; Exod. xii. 2. This month had two names ; 
Abib, chap. xiii. 4, and Nisan, Nehem. ii. 1; Esth. iii. 7. 
It is called Abib, that is, the earing month, or the month of 
new corn, for abib signifies a green or new ear of corn, such 
as was grown to maturity, but not dried or fit for grinding. 
In the second chapter of Leviticus the offering of the first- 
fruits is called abib, and it is ordered to be dried by the fire, 
in order to its being beaten or ground into flour, ver. 14 
Eng., 13. Heb. ; and in the ninth chapter of Exodus the barley 
is said to be smitten with hail, because it was abib, ver. 31 ; 
that is, in the ear. Hence the Septuagint translates abib, 
wherever it is used for the name of a month, jurjva rwv vswv, 
understanding, no doubt, napirajv. So the Vulgate also ren 
ders it, " mensis novarum frugum." 

The other name, Nisan, is derived by some from DU mis. 
fugere; and so it signifies the month of flight, namely, of the 
Israelites out of Egypt. Others derive it from D3 nes, vex- 
illum, or DDI nasas, vexillum tulit; and so it signifies the 
month of war, when campaigns usually began. Perhaps 
" the time when kings go forth to battle," a phrase used in 
the Second Book of Samuel, chap. xi. 1, may only be a peri- 
phrasis for the month Nisan. Thus the Romans called this 



454 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



month Martius, " quasi mensis Marti sacer:" the Bithynians 
styled the two first spring months arparuog and zpuoc, from 
Aprjg, Mars, the god of war. # But there are others who 
derive it from the Arabic and Syriac word DU nus, conturbatus 
est, because it is usually a stormy month. 

Secondly. As to the day of the month, when this feast was 
to begin, it was ordered to be on the fourteenth at even, at 
which time the paschal lamb was to be killed and eaten, and 
from thence the feast was to be kept seven days, till the 
twenty-first: Exod. xii. 6. 8. 15; Lev. xxiii. 5, 6. Sacrifices, 
peculiar to this festival, were to be offered on each of the 
seven days ; but the first and last, namely, the fifteenth and 
the twenty-first, were to be sanctified above all the rest, as 
sabbaths, by abstaining from all servile labour, and holding a 
holy convocation, Exod. xii. 16; Lev. xxiii. 7, 8; especially 
the seventh or last day was called mn^ chag Laiovah, 
" a feast unto the Lord," kut e^oxnv, Exod. xiii. 6, and 
\T\rv>b mjfjf gnalsereth Laiovah, which we render " a solemn 
assembly," Deut. xvi. 8; but mjty gnatsereth, from 
gnatsar, dausit vel cohibuit, rather signifies a restraint from 
all worldly business and servile labour. 

The reason of the first and seventh day being thus pecu- 
liarly consecrated above the rest is, by Bochart, supposed to 
be, because the first was the day of the Israelites' escape out 
of Egypt, and the seventh that on which Pharaoh and his 
army were destroyed in the Red Sea.f But the special holi- 
ness of the first and the last day being a circumstance common 
to the feast of tabernacles, as well as the passover (Lev. xxiii. 
39; John vii.37), for this reason others think it was intended 
to signify in general, that we should persevere in the diligent 
prosecution of the business of religion to the end of our lives, 
and, instead of growing more remiss, should be the more active 
and vigorous, the nearer we arrive to the period of our race, to 
our heavenly rest and reward : agreeable to the exhortation of 
St. Peter, — " Wherefore, seeing ye look for such things, be 
diligent, that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, 
and blameless," 2 Pet. iii. 14; and of the author of the 

* Bochart. Hieroz, lib. ii. cap. 1. Oper. torn. ii. p. 557, 558, edit. Lugd 
Bat. 1712. 

f Hierozoic. ubi supra, p. 602. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVEK. 



455 



Epistle to the Hebrews, — " exhorting one another so much the 
more, as ye see the day approaching;" chap. x. 25. 

Although the whole time of the continuance of this feast is in 
a more lax sense styled the passover, Johnxviii. 39 ; Luke xxii. 
1 ; yet, strictly speaking, the passover was kept only on the 
evening of the fourteenth day of the month, and the ensuing 
seven days were the feast of unleavened bread ; so called be- 
cause during their continuance the Jews were to eat unleavened 
bread, and to have no other in their houses. This distinction 
between the passover and the feast of unleavened bread is 
made in the Second Book of Chronicles : " The children of 
Israel kept the passover, and the feast of unleavened bread 
seven days," chap. xxxv. 17: and in the Book of Ezra: 
" The children of the captivity kept the passover upon the 
fourteenth day of the first month, and kept the feast of un- 
leavened bread seven days, with joy;" chap. vi. 19. 22. 

It is an inquiry, which hath occasioned no little debate, 
whether Christ kept his last passover at the same time with 
the rest of the Jews, or one day sooner. Several consider- 
able critics* are of opinion, that, for special reasons, he 

* Vid. Grotii Annot. in Matt. xxvi. 18; Scaliger. de Emend. Tempor. 
lib. vi. p. 567, et seq. edit. Collon. Allob. 1629; Casaubon. Exercitat. in 
Baronii Annates, exerc. xvi. sect. xii. — xxi. p. 405 — 439, edit. Genev. 1655; 
Cudvvorth's True Notion of the Lord's Supper, chap, iii.; Saubertus de Ul- 
timo Christi Paschate, cap. i. sect. viii. — xii.; apud Thesaurum Theolog. 
Philolog. vol. ii. p. 195. 199. It is remarkable, that these eminent critics, 
who all agree that Christ ate the passover on a different day from the Jews, 
are divided in their opinions concerning the method of accounting for it. 
Grotius distinguishes between the paschal sacrifice, and a supper comme- 
morative of the passover, and supposes our Saviour celebrated the latter 
only, before the time prescribed by the law for the paschal sacrifice, which 
he foresaw his death would prevent his observing. Scaliger and Causabon 
apprehend, that Christ ate the paschal sacrifice on the day perscribed by the 
law, but not when the Jews did, they having deferred it, according to their 
supposed custom when it fell the day before the sabbath, that there might 
not be two sabbaths together. Cudworth opposes the notions both of Grotius 
and Scaliger, and makes the ground of this difference of the days to be, that 
our Saviour and his apostles, and divers others of the most religious Jews, 
regulated the time of their observation of the passover by computing from 
the true phasis of the moon, and not by the decree of the senate. The 
opinion of Grotius, concerning the ground of this difference of the days, is 
justly exploded likewise by Leidekker, de Republ. Hebraeor. lib. ix. cap. iv. 
p. 551, 552, though he strenuously maintains, that the days were different. 



456 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



kept it the day before the stated and usual time. This sen- 
timent they ground on several passages of Scripture; particu- 
larly on the account in the thirteenth chapter of St. John, ver. 
1 — 29, of the supper which Christ ate with his disciples, which , 
if it be, as there is good reason to believe it was, the last supper 
he ate with them, that is, the passover supper, it is expressly 
said to be before the feast of the passover, that is, before 
the usual time of keeping it. Again, the disciples ima- 
gined their Lord had ordered Judas " to buy those things 
they had need of against the feast," ver. 29; which seems to 
imply, that although for particular reasons he ate the paschal 
lamb that evening, nevertheless the time of the feast was not 
yet arrived. 

Another passage, alleged in support of this opinion, is in 
the eighteenth chapter of St. John, where we are informed, 
that on the day of our Saviour's crucifixion, which was the 
day after he had ate the passover, the Jews f< would not go 
into the judgment-hall, lest they should be defiled; but that 
they might eat the passover," ver. 28: which implies, it 
is said, that they had not yet ate it. 

Again, in the nineteenth chapter, the same day, that is, the 
day of our Lord's crucifixion, is said to be the " preparation 
of the passover," ver. 14; and therefore, it is alleged, the 
passover could not yet be eaten. 

Dr. Whitby argues on the opposite side of the question in 
the following manner : # 

1st. In the twenty-sixth chapter of St. Matthew it is said, 
that on " the first day of unleavened bread the disciples 
prepared the passover," ver. 17; and in the evening Christ 
ate it with them : and in St. Mark it is observed, that this 
was the day on which they, that is, the Jews, killed the 
passover; chap. xiv. 12. 

2dly. Christ says to his disciples, " Ye know that after 

Deylingius, in conformity with the opinion of several other learned men, 
supposes, that Christ did not celebrate the passover at all, but only his own 
supper (Observationes Sacra, vol. i. observ. lii. sect. xiv. — xix.), but he is 
confuted by Harenberg, in his Dissert, on John xviii. 28, sect. xxvi. et seq., 
published in the Thesaurus Novus Theologico-Philolog. 

* See his Dissertation on this subject, in an Appendix to the fourteenth 
chapter of St, Mark. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



457 



two days is. the feast of the passover;" Matt. xxvi. 2. Now 
the feast of the passover and of unleavened bread is one and 
the same, or at the same time, Mark xiv. 1; Luke xxii. 1. 
Since, therefore, as hath been just shown, Christ did not eat the 
passover till the first day of unleavened bread, it follows that he 
did not eat it till after those two days, that is, at the time when 
the disciples knew it was to be eaten according to the law. 

3dly. The day following our Saviour's eating the passover. 
was a feast-day ; for Barabbas, it is said, was released at the 
feast: Matt, xxvii. 15. 26; Mark xv. 6. 15. Now the first 
day of the feast of unleavened bread, in which a holy con- 
vocation was held, was the day after eating the passover; 
Lev. xxiii. 4, et seq. 

4thly. As Christ was " made under the law," which con- 
tinued in full force till after his resurrection, he could not 
have kept the passover the day before the law prescribed it, 
without just censure, nor before the rest of the Jews observed 
it, according to their interpretation of the law, without their 
censure, which he does not appear to have incurred; nor can 
it be imagined his disciples would have come to him with that 
question, " Where wilt thou that we prepare to eat the pass- 
over," before the time which the law appointed, or which was 
usual, for eating it. 

5thly. The paschal lamb could not be slain but " in the place 
which God had chosen to put his name there," Deut. xvi. 6 ; 
that is, in the tabernacle or temple. Now it cannot be sup- 
posed that the priests would have killed the paschal lamb for 
Jesus, or suffered it to have been killed in the temple, before 
the day which the law prescribed, namely, the fourteenth day 
of the month Nisan, when they killed it for all the people ; or 
before the day which was observed according to their rules 
of interpreting the law. 

These reasons seem to me to prove unanswerably, that 
Christ ate the passover at the usual time, when the rest of 
the Jews did. Let us then inquire, how the passages alleged 
to the contrary are to be understood. 

1st. Bishop Kidder,^ and the Doctors Lightfootf and 
Whitby, J are of opinion, that the supper spoken of in the 

* Demonst. of the Messiah, chap. iii. p. 60, 61. 

f Horae Hebr. Matt. xxvi. 6. \ Ubi supra. 



458 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book 111 . 



thirteenth chapter of St. John was not the passover, but ano- 
ther supper at Bethany some nights before ; but the contrary 
is proved by Dr. Doddridge and Dr. Guyse.* As for the 
phrase, " Before the feast of the passover," ver. \, it need 
only be understood to mean before the feast began, or before 
they sat down to supper ; and Senrvov yevo/Jievov, which in our 
version is, " supper being ended," ver. 2, may be better 
rendered, ' f supper being come :" irpwiaq ytvofieviis signifies 
" when morning was come," John xxi. 4 : r)fj.zpag ytvofxevrjc, 
** when day was come," Acts xii. 18 ; xvi. 35 : aiyr\Q yEvofitvris, 
" when silence was made ;" chap. xxi. 40. 

As to Judas's buying things against the feast, it is easy to 
be understood of the sacrifices, and whatever they would need 
to celebrate the ensuing festival, or the feast of unleavened 
bread. 

2dly. The passage in the eighteenth chapter of St. John, 
relating to the solicitude which the Jews expressed, not to be 
defiled on the day of our Lord's crucifixion, in order that they 
might eat the passover, ver. 28 ; may be understood of the sa- 
crifices which were offered on the feast of unleavened bread, 
otherwise called the passover. 

3dly. As for the irapaaKtvr) rov iraa^a, or preparation of the 
passover, spoken of in the nineteenth chapter of St. John, 
ver. 14, as being the day of our Lord's crucifixion, it signifies 
the preparation for the paschal sabbath, or the sabbath which 
fell in the paschal week, and was observed with some pecu- 
liar solemnity ; for it was esteemed to be, as it is expressly 
styled, ver. 31, " an high day," or the great day of the 
feast.f 

* See Doddridge and Guyse in ver. 1 . 

f Among those who maintain that our Saviour kept the passover at the 
same time with the Jews, see Bochart. Hieroz. lib. ii. cap. i. Oper. torn. ii. 
p. 560 — 571, 4th edit. Lugd. Bat. 1712; Basnage in his History of the Jews, 
lib. v. cap. x. sect. xliv. p. 437 ; Frischmuthi Dissertat. in Matt. xxvi. 2, 
apud Thesaur. Theolog. Philolog. torn. ii. p. 189; Harenbergi Dissertat. in 
Joh. xviii. 28, apud Thesaur. Nov. Theolog. Philolog. torn. ii. p. 538 ; Re- 
land. Antiq. pars iv. cap. iii. sect. ix. ad ult. p. 467 — 472, 3d edit. 1717. 
Bynaeus, de Morte Christi, lib. i. cap. i. sect. xix. — xxxii. p. 24 — 65, edit. 
Amstel. 1691, hath represented the arguments on both sides. See also 
Witsii Meletem. dissert, xi. ; and Leusden. Philolog. Hebraeo-mixt. dissert, 
xxxviii. de Paschate, quaest. v. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



459 



Thirdly. As to the time of the day, when the passover was 
to be killed and eaten, it was D^myn ^2 bein hangnarbaim, 
** between the two evenings," Exod. xii. 6; which means the 
after part of the day, as appears from the use of the same 
phrase in the twenty-eighth chapter of the book of Numbers, 
where it stands opposed to the morning : " One lamb shalt 
thou offer in the morning, and the other lamb shalt thou offer 
at evening ;" ver. 4. But what part or hour of the afternoon 
is intended by it, is disputed between the Rabbinists and the 
Karraites. 

The Rabbinists understand by the first of the two evenings, 
the time of the sun's beginning to decline from his meridian 
altitude, which they fix at half an hour after twelve ; by the 
other, the time of his setting. In the same manner the an- 
cient Grecians distinguish between the two evenings, as we 
learn from a note of Eustatius on the seventeenth book of 
the Odyssey; who saith, that, according to the ancients, there 
are two evenings ; one, which they called the latter evening, 
at the close of the day ; the other, the former evening, which 
commences presently after noon.* These were the two even- 
ings more generally understood by the Jews in the time of 
Josephus ; for, he says, they killed the paschal lamb from the 
ninth hour to the eleventh, that is, from our three to five 
o'clock in the afternoon .f 

The Karraites understand the first of the two evenings to 
commence from sun-set; before which, according to them, 
the passover was not to be killed and eaten ; and the latter, 
from the beginning of dark night ; so that, in their opinion, 
" between the two evenings" means in the twilight. Their 
notion, at least as to the time of eating the passover, seems 
to be countenanced by the letter of the law in Deuteronomy : 
" Thou shalt sacrifice the passover at evening, at the going 
down of the sun ;" chap. xvi. 6. And in the book of Joshua 
it is said, that " the children of Israel encamped in Gilgal, 
and kept the passover on the fourteenth day of the month at 
even;" chap. v. 10. Nevertheless, the duration of the twilight 
at the equinoctial seasons, at one of which the passover was 

* Vid. Bochart. Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. 1. Oper. torn, ii, p. 559, 
edit. 1712. 

f De Bello Judaic, lib.vi. cap. ix. sect. iii. p. 399, edit. Haverc. 



460 



JEWISH 



AiNTIQU ITIES. 



[book in. 



kept, being shorter than at any other time of the year, would 
hardly afford time sufficient, especially in that climate, for 
killing, roasting, and eating the lamb. It is, therefore, pro- 
bable, either that by " sacrificing and keeping the passover," 
in the forecited text in Deuteronomy, is meant merely the 
• eating of it; or that, by "evening and the going down of the 
sun," is denoted the whole time of its declining from the 
meridian altitude till sun-set. * 

Thus much for the time of this feast. 

2dly. Concerning the rites with w T hich it was to be cele- 
brated, we are to observe, 

1st. The matter of the paschal feast; which was to be " a 
lamb without blemish, a male of the first year from the sheep 
or from the goats;" Exod. xii. 5. The Hebrew word nitf seh, 
which we render lamb, signifies the young either of the sheep 
or of the goats ; which we have no English word, as I re- 
member, to answer. The nw seh of the passover might be, 
what we call either a lamb or a kid. But as lambs were pre- 
ferable, being the better food, Theodoretf hath probably given 
the just sense of this law : " He that has a lamb, let him offer 
it; but if not, let him offer a kid."l Though our Saviour, 
therefore, is so often called a lamb, in reference to this an- 
cient type of him, yet he is never called a kid. 

The paschal lamb must be a male ; which is accounted pre- 
ferable to a female; Mai. i. 14. Therefore, though the peace- 
offerings, which were eaten by the people,, might be either 
male or female, Levit. iii. 6 ; yet the burnt-offerings, which .. 
were wholly offered to God, or consumed upon his altar, and 
which were, therefore, the more perfect sacrifices, must be all 
males ; chap. i. 3. 10. 

Perhaps in this circumstance, as in many others, Jehovah 
designed to oppose the rites of the Jewish worship to the 
customs of the idolatrous Gentiles, who esteemed sacrifices of 
the female kind to be the most valuable, and the most accept- 

* On this controversy see Martinii Etymotogicum ; Buxtorfii Lexic. Biblic. ; 
et Bocharti Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. 1. p. 558 — 560. 

f Theodorit. Quaestion. in Exod. qusest. xxiv. Oper. torn. i. p. 90, B, 
edit. Paris, 1642. 

I Vid. Mishn. tit. Cherithoth, cap. vi. sect. ix. cum not. Bartenor. torn v. 
p. 265. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



461 



able to their gods : " In omnibus saeris fceminei generis plus 
valent victimae," says Servius in his notes on Virgil. * We 
are informed, indeed, by Herodotus, that it was the custom 
of the Egyptians to offer only males/]- which Bochart supposes 
they borrowed from the Jews.£ 

Again, the paschal lamb must be rw-p ben-shanah, " the 
son of a year ;" by which some understand a lamb of the last 
year, which, considering the usual yeaning time, must be up- 
ward of a year old at the season of the passover. But as a 
lamb grown to that degree of maturity was rather too large 
to be conveniently roasted whole, and eaten up at one family 
meal, as the paschal lamb was to be ; the opinion of the Jew- 
ish doctors is, in this instance, more probable, that it was to 
be a lamb of the present year, or of the last yeaning time,§ 
which ordinarily preceded the passover by a month or two. 
This well agrees with the use of the Hebrew phrase, " The 
son of so many years which ordinarily signifies the year 
current ; as appears from the seventh chapter of Genesis, 
wherein it is said, that " Noah was six hundred years old," 
JUNO ben-shesh meofh, the son of six hundred years, 

" when the flood of waters was upon the earth," ver. 6 ; and 
presently afterward this is said to be in the " six hundredth 
year of Noah's life/' ver. 11. Thus the priests and Levites 
were to enter on their ministry 'f at thirty years old," Numb, 
iv. 3 ; but that is properly to be understood of the year cur- 
rent, or when they had entered on the thirtieth year. So 
Christ entered on his public ministry, warn enov rptaKovra 
apxpiuEvoQ, when he began to be about thirty 3^ears of age: 
Luke iii. 23. 

The age then of the paschal lamb is thus determined by the 
rabbies ; it must not be less than eight days, and yet under a 
year old : not less than eight days, for so is the law concern- 
ing firstlings and burnt-offerings, that they were to be seven 
days with the dam, and from the eighth they might be ac- 
cepted in sacrifices, Exod. xxii. 30 ; Lev. xxii. 27 : which 

* Serv. in iEneid. viii. v. 641. Other proofs may be seen in Bochart 
Hieroz. part i. lib. ii. cap. xxxiii. Oper. torn. ii. p. 322. 
f Herodot. Euterp. cap. xli. p. 104, edit. Gronov. 
X Ubi supra, p. 321, et cap. 1. p. 584. 

§ Vid. Cartwright. Electa Targumico-rabbin. in Exod. xii. 5. 



462 



J EWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



| BOOK Iff. 



law the Jewish doctors extend, and perhaps not without 
reason, to the paschal sacrifice; and Maimonides says, " If 
the lamb was older than the year only an hour, it was not 
permitted as an oblation.* 

Once more, As to the qualities of the paschal lamb, " It 
must be without blemish/' The rabbies reckon up fifty ble- 
mishes, which disqualified beasts for sacrifices ; as five in the 
ear, three in the eyelid, eight in the eye, &c.;f but what 
those blemishes were, which disqualify according to the law 
of God, sufficiently appears in the twenty-second chapter of 
Leviticus : the beasts that were blind, or broken, or maimed, 
or that had a wen, or the scurvy or scab, or any part su- 
perfluous or defective, or that was bruised, or crushed, or 
broken, or cut; these were not to be offered in sacrifice; ver. 
20—24. 

We must not pass over a conjecture of some persons con- 
cerning the reason of God's commanding the Israelites to eat 
a male lamb, or young ram, with so much solemnity about the 
vernal equinox ; namely, that it was in opposition to the 
idolatry of the Egyptians, who at this season, of the sun's 
entering into the sign Aries, paid some solemn worship to the 
creature by whose name that sign was distinguished. The 
author of the Chronicon Orientale, as quoted by Patrick,^ 
saith, that the day on which the sun entered Aries was most 
solemn among the Egyptians ; and R . Abraham Seba ob- 
serves, that this feast of the Egyptians being at its height on 
the fourteenth day, God ordered the killing and eating of 
a lamb at that time in contempt, it should seem, of their 
worship of Aries, and as a sensible evidence, that he could be 
no god whom the Israelites eat.|| Rabbi Levi Ben Gershom 
saith, God intended by this to expel from the minds of the 

* Maimon. de Ratione Sacrificiomm Faciendorum, cap. i. sect. xii. xiii. 
apud Crenii Fascicul. Sext. p. 288. 

f Maimon. de Ratione adeundi Templi, cap. vii. apud Crenii Fascic. 
Sext. p. 208, et seq. 

X Patrick on Exod. xii. 3. 

§ Tzeror. Hammor. fol. 70. col. 4. See the passage in Spencer de Legibus 
Hebrseor. lib. ii. cap. iv. sect. i. vol. i. p. 296, edit. Cantab. 1727. 

|| " Cseso ariete," says Ticitus, " velut in contumeliam Hammonis," His- 
tor. lib. v. cap. iv. p. 200, edit. Glasg. 1743. See also Targum Jonathan on 
Exod. viii. 22, in Walton's Polyglot, torn. iv. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



463 



Israelites the bad opinions of the Egyptians. This, however, 
Dr. Patrick looks upon to be mere conjecture.* The 

Second thing we observe in the paschal rites is the taking 
the lamb from the flock four days before it was killed; Exod. 
xii. 3. For which the rabbies assign the following reasons : 
that the providing it might not, through a hurry of business, 
especially at the time of their departure from Egypt, be neg- 
lected till it was too late : that by having it so long with them 
before it was killed, they might have the better opportunity 
of observing, whether there were any blemishes in it : and by 
having it before their eyes so considerable a time, might be 
more effectually reminded of the mercy of their deliverance 
out of Egypt : and likewise to prepare themselves for so great 
a solemnity as the approaching feast. On these accounts, 
some of the rabbies inform us, it was customary to have the 
lamb tied these four days to their bed-posts ; a rite which 
they make to be necessary and essential to the passover in 
all ages.f 

Others conceive, with an equal degree of probability, that 
this was one of those circumstances of the first passover, 
which were not designed to be continued and practised after- 
wards ; of which sort we shall observe several others. It was 
highly proper the providing the lamb before their departure 
out of Egypt should not be left to the very day of their de- 
parture, when they must unavoidably be in some hurry and 
confusion : a reason, however, which would not take place in 
after-times. Besides, those who came annually out of all parts 
of the country to keep the passover at Jerusalem, could not 
well observe it, unless they came at least four days before-hand . 
It is indeed related in the eleventh chapter of St. John, ver. 
55, " that many went out of the country to Jerusalem before 
the passover;" but the reason assigned is, that it was "to 
purify themselves." Nothing is said of their providing lambs 
beforehand. It moreover appears, that on the former part of 
that very day on which the passover was to be killed and eaten, 
Christ and his disciples had not so much as provided a place 
where they should eat it : for " the disciples said unto him, 

* Patrick, ubi supra. 

f Targum Jonathan et R. Solomon in loc. Vid. Cartwright. Electa Tar- 
oumico-rabbin. in Exod. xii. 3. 



464 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[J300K III. 



Where wilt thou, that we go and prepare, that thou mayest 
eat the passover;" Mark xiv. 12. Whereas, if they had pro- 
vided the lamb four days before, they would in all probability 
have kept it at the house where they intended to eat it; and 
there would have been then no room for this question. It is 
more likely they went and bought one in the market, kept on 
the preparation of the passover for that purpose, as well as to 
furnish the other sacrifices that were to be offered on the en- 
suing festival : which market some had profanely brought into 
the very court of the temple; John ii. 13, 14. Again, if the 
lamb, the principal thing, had been provided, it is not so pro- 
bable the disciples should have supposed, as we know they 
did, that Christ by his speech to Judas, " What thou doest, 
do quickly," meant, that he should " buy those things which 
they had need of against the feast;" chap. xiii. 27. 29. 

3dly. Next followed the killing of the paschal lamb ; which 
at the first passover in Egypt, as there was no national altar, 
was performed in private houses. But after their settlement 
in Canaan, it was ordered to be done in " the place which 
the Lord should choose to place his name there;" Deut. xvi. 
2. By the name of God in this passage is denoted God him- 
self: to " call upon his name" is to call upon him. And by 
placing his name there, is meant fixing in that place the spe- 
cial tokens of his presence, as the ark, with the mercy-seat 
and the cloud of glory over it. This place seems at first to 
have been Mispah, afterward Shiloh; and when that was de- 
stroyed, the ark was removed to several places, till at last it 
was fixed at Jerusalem. 

It is observable, that though there is frequent mention in 
the law of Moses of some place which God would choose to 
fix his name there, it is nowhere declared where that place 
should be. For this Maimonides # assigns several reasons; 
the best and most probable is, lest every tribe should desire 
to have that place to their lot, and thus strife and contention 
should arise among them. But when the place was after- 
ward fixed by a new revelation, there the national altar was 
to be erected, and thither all their sacrifices were ordinarily 
to be brought and offered. The law to which we before re- 

* Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xlv. p. 475, edit, et vers. Bux- 
torf. Basil. 1629. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



465 



ferred, concerning their " sacrificing the passover unto the 
Lord their God, of the flock and of the herd, in the place 
which the Lord should choose to place his name there," 
Deut. xvi. 2, chiefly respects the sacrifices that were to be 
offered on the seven days of the feast of unleavened bread, 
which feast, we have observed before, was sometimes called 
the passover ; as appears, in that the sacrifice of the passover 
is said to be of the flock and of the herd ; whereas the pass- 
over, properly so called, was of the flock only. This law, 
nevertheless, included the paschal lamb, and was so under- 
stood by the ancient Jews, as is evident from the account of 
the solemn passover kept in the reign of king Josiah, 2 Chron. 
xxxv. 5, 6. 10, 11, when " the priests and the Levites stood 
in the holy place, and they slew the passover, and the priests 
sprinkled the blood, and the Levites flayed it." They who 
killed the passover, are distinguished from the priests who 
sprinkled the blood ; for a common Israelite might kill the 
paschal lamb, according to the law in Exodus, chap. xii. 6, 
" the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill 
it." Accordingly, in the passover which was kept in Heze- 
kiah's reign, the service of killing the passover fell upon the 
Levites, only for those of the congregation that were not 
clean, 2 Chron. xxx. 17; otherwise, every Israelite was to 
kill his own paschal lamb. Nor was this a circumstance pe- 
culiar to the passover; in all other sacrifices, even in burnt- 
offerings, which were reckoned the most solemn and sacred 
of all others, every man might kill his own sacrifice. The 
proper duty of the priests was only to sprinkle the blood, and 
offer it on the altar after it was slain; Lev. i. 2 — 5. The 
argument, therefore, as formerly hinted, which some have 
alleged against the priesthood of Christ, and the sacrifice of 
his death, that then, as priest, he must have killed himself, 
is futile and groundless, because it did not properly belong to 
the priests to kill the sacrifices. We proceed to the 

4th. article of the paschal rites, the sprinkling of the 
blood ; in order to which it must be received in a bason : 
" He shall take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the bason," 
rpn besaph ; Exod. xii. 22. Both the Septuagint and the 
Vulgate seem to have mistaken the meaning of this word, 

2 H 



466 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



taking it to signify the door, or the threshold of the house, 
where some suppose the lamb was killed. The Septuagint 
renders it irapa tt\v Svpav; the Vulgate, in limine; whereas 
D*DD sippim and niDD sippoth, which are plurals of fp saph, 
are mentioned among the vessels of the sanctuary in the First 
Book of Kings, chap. vii. 50, and in Jeremiah, chap. Hi. 19. 
This blood was to be sprinkled with a bunch of hyssop upon 
the lintel and the two side-posts of the doors of their houses, 
as a signal to the destroying angel to pass over those that 
were thus marked when he went forth to smite the first-born 
in all the other houses in Egypt; Exod. xii. 13 — 23. The 
blood was to be sprinkled only on the lintel and the side-posts, 
not on the threshold, that it might not be trod on, but that a 
proper reverence might be preserved for it as sacred and typical. 
It cannot be supposed, either that this blood had any natural 
virtue in it to preserve the family upon whose house it was 
sprinkled from the plague, or that God or his angel needed 
such a signal to distinguish between Egyptians and Israelites. 
The use of it could only be as a sensible token of the Divine 
promise of protection and safety to the Israelites, designed to 
assist and encourage their faith. With the like view God made 
the rainbow a token or sign of his covenant and promise to 
Noah, that he would never again bring a deluge on the earth; 
Gen. ix. 10 — 15. No doubt the blood of the paschal lamb, 
sprinkled on their houses, was intended, likewise, to be a typi- 
cal sign of protection from the vengeance of God through the 
blood of Christ, which is therefore called " the blood of sprink- 
ling;" Heb. xii. 24. In both respects it is said that Moses 
" through faith kept the passover and the sprinkling of blood," 
chap. xi. 28; through faith in God's promise of a present 
temporal protection, and through faith in the blood of Christ, 
as typified by this blood, for spiritual and eternal salvation. 

The Egyptians, who were, in many cases, unacquainted 
with the original of their own rites, had among them, many 
ages afterward, according to Epiphanius, a very sensible 
memorial of the preservation of the Israelites, by this red mark 
being fixed on their houses ; for at the vernal equinox, which 
was the time of the passover, they used to mark their sheep, 
their trees, and the like, sk juuXrtwg, with red ochre, or some- 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



467 



what of that kind, which they supposed would preserve 
them.* 

The circumstance of sprinkling blood upon the door-posts 
was plainly peculiar to the first passover ; for we find in after- 
ages, when the paschal lamb was killed in the court of the 
tabernacle or temple, the blood of it was sprinkled on the 
altar like the blood of the other sacrifices; 2 Chron. xxxv. Hi 

5thly. The paschal lamb was to be roasted whole. " Eat 
it not raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire, 
his head, with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof;" 
Exod. xii. 9. The prohibition of eating it raw, for which 
there might seem to be little occasion, since mankind have 
generally abhorred such food, is understood by some to have 
been given in opposition to the barbarous customs of the 
heathens, who in their feasts of Bacchus, which, according to 
Herodotusf and Plutarch,^ had their original in Egypt, used 
to tear the members of living creatures to pieces, and eat 
them raw. It is therefore observable, that the Syriac version 
renders the clause, " Eat not of it raw, eat not of it while it is 
al ive."§ 

Bochart, after R. Solomon and Aben-Ezra, derives the 
Hebrew word x: na, which we render raw, from the Arabic 

naa, or S3 ni, semicoctus, half-dressed.|| 

The paschal lamb was to be roasted ; which, besides its 
typical meaning, to be hereafter considered, might be ordered 
as a matter of convenience at the first passover, in order that 
their boiling vessels might be packed up, ready for their 
march out of Egypt, while the lamb was roasting. 

It must be " roasted whole, with its legs and appur- 
tenances." By the appurtenances we are not to understand 
the guts, but the heart, lights, liver, and whatever other parts 
of the inwards are fit for food. This injunction might perhaps 
be designedly opposed to the superstition of the Gentiles, who 

* Epiphan. adversus Hseres. hseres. xviii. Nazaraeor. sect. iii. p. 39, edit. 
Petav. 

f Herodot'. Euterp. cap. xlix. p. 107, 108, edit. Gronov. 
X Plutarch, de Iside et Osiride, Oper. torn. ii. p. 355, 356. 362, B, &c. 
edit. Francfort. 1620. 

§ Spencer, de Leg. Hebr. lib. ii. cap. iv. sect. ii. p. 300 — 3035. 
|| Hierozoic. lib. ii. cap. 1. Oper. torn. ii. p. 595. 

2 h 2 



468 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



used to rake into the entrails of their sacrifices, and collect 
auguries from them; and it might be partly intended for ex- 
pedition in the celebration of the first passover. 

6thly. The first passover was to be eaten standing, in the 
posture of travellers, who had no time to lose, and with un- 
leavened bread and bitter herbs, and no bone of it was to be 
broken; Exod. xii. 8. 11. 46. The posture of travellers was 
enjoined them, both to enliven their faith in the promise of 
their now speedy deliverance from Egypt; and also, that they 
might be ready to begin their march presently after supper. 
They were ordered, therefore, to eat it with their loins girded ; 
for as they were accustomed to wear long and loose garments, 
such as are generally used by the eastern nations to this day, it 
was necessary to tie them up with a girdle about their loins, 
when they either travelled or betook themselves to any labo- 
rious employment. Thus, when Elisha sent his servant Ge- 
hazi on a message in haste, he bade him " gird up his loins," 
2 Kings iv. 29 ; and when our Saviour set about washing his 
disciples' feet, "he took a towel and girded himself;'' John 
xiii. 4. 

They were to eat the passover " with shoes on their feet ;" 
for in those hot countries they ordinarily wore sandals, which 
were a sort of clogs, or went barefoot. But in travelling they 
used shoes, which were indeed a sort of short boots, reaching 
a little way up the legs.* Hence, when our Saviour sent his 
twelve disciples to preach in the neighbouring towns, design- 
ing to convince them by their own experience of the extra- 
ordinary care of Divine Providence over them, that they might 
not be discouraged by the length and danger of the journeys 
they would be called to undertake; I say, on this account he 
ordered them to make no provision for their present journey, 
particularly not to take shoes on their feet, but to be shod 
with sandals; Matt, x, 10, compared with Mark vi. 9. 

The Ethiopian Christians have indeed found out another 

* See Wagenseil, Sotah, p. 664, edit. Altdorf. 1674, or in Mish. Suren- 
husii, torn. iii. p. 261 ; Lightfoot's Horse Hebr. Matt. x. 10; Sagittarius de 
Nudipedalibus Veterum, cap. i. sect. xix. et seq. apud Syntagma Disser- 
tationum, torn. i. p. 272, et seq. Rotterod. 1699. But Bynseus is of opinion, 
that shoes and sandals are the same, De Calceis Hebrseoram, lib. i. cap. vi. 
sect. ix. x, p. 90—98, Dordrac 1715. 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



469 



reason for the Israelites being commanded to eat the first 
passover with shoes on their feet; namely, because the land 
of Egypt was polluted; whereas at Mount Sinai God com- 
manded Moses to put off his shoes from his feet, because the 
place was holy ; and for this reason the Ethiopians say it is a 
custom with them to be barefoot in their churches. # 

Again, they were to eat the passover with staves in their 
hands, such as were always used by travellers in those rocky 
countries, both to support them in slippery places, and 
defend them against assaults ; see Gen. xxxii. 10. Of this 
sort was probably Moses's rod, which he had in his hand 
when God sent him with a message to Pharaoh, Exod. iv. 2, 
and which was afterward used as an instrument in working so 
many miracles. So necessary in these countries was a staff, 
or walking-stick, on a journey, that it was a usual thing for 
persons, when they undertook long journeys, to take a spare 
staff with them, for fear one should fail. When Christ, there- 
fore, sent his apostles on that embassy which we mentioned 
before, he ordered them not to take staves, /zrjrt pafiSovg, Luke 
ix. 3 ; that is, only one staff or walking-stick, without making- 
provision of a spare one, as was common in long journeys; or, 
as it is in St. Mark, chap. vi. 8, " save a staff only/' If 
therefore we adhere to the common reading in the parallel 
passage in St. Matthew, where Christ bade them take jULtjre 
pafiSov, not a staff, chap. x. 10, it must be understood of a 
spare staff. Nevertheless many copies have pafiSovg in this 
place, which is followed in our translation. 

INow these circumstances were plainly peculiar to the first 
passover; for when the children of Israel were settled in the 
land of Canaan, they no longer eat the paschal lamb in the 
posture of travellers, but like men at rest and ease, sitting, or 
rather lying, on couches; the posture in which our Saviour 
and his disciples ate the passover; John xiii. 23. 

The paschal lamb was to be eaten with unleavened bread ; 
in the Hebrew, J"tt¥D matsoth, which some derive from 
matsets, or rt!fft matsah, compressit, because bread made with- 
out yeast or leaven is heavy and close, as if pressed toge- 

* Damianus Goensis de Moribus iEthiopum, cited by Sagittarius de Nu- 
dipedalibus Veterum, cap. ii. sect. xv. ubi supra, p. 305, 306, Rotterod, 
1699. 



470 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[HOOK 111. 



ther. Bochart rejects this derivation, and derives it from 
an Arabic word, with the same radicals, which signifies pure 
and sincere;* and so DI^D matsoth signifies bread made of 
pure flour and water, without any mixture. This suits best 
with the apostle's allusion : " Therefore let us keep the feast, 
not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and 
wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and 
truth;" 1 Cor. v. 8. 

The reason of the injunction to eat the paschal lamb with 
unleavened bread was, partly, to remind them of the hard- 
ships they had sustained in Egypt, unleavened being more 
heavy and less palatable than leavened bread ; and it is, there- 
fore, called the bread of affliction, Deut. xvi. 3; and partly 
to commemorate the speed of their deliverance or departure 
from thence, which was such, that they had not sufficient time 
to leaven their bread ; it is expressly said, that their " dough 
was not leavened, because they were thrust out of Egypt, and 
could not tarry," Exod. xii. 39 ; and on this account it was 
enacted into a standing law : " Thou shalt eat unleavened 
bread, even the bread of affliction ; for thou earnest forth out 
of Egypt in haste;" Deut. xvi. 3. This rite, therefore, was 
not only observed at the first passover, but in all succeeding 
ages. 

The salad, or sauce, of bitter herbs was doubtless prescribed 
for the same reason ; namely, to be a memorial of that severe 
bondage in Egypt, which " made their lives bitter to them," 
Exod. i. 14; and possibly, also, to denote the haste they were 
in, which laid them under a necessity of taking up with such 
wild herbs as were readiest at hand. We have not any ac- 
count what herbs in particular these were, except from the 
conjectures of the rabbies, which are not worth our atten- 
tion .f 

To this salad, or sauce, the latter Jews, as Godwin observes, 
add another, of sweet and bitter things, as dates, figs, raisins, 
vinegar, and other ingredients, pounded and mixed up to- 
gether to the consistence of mustard, which they call nD^n 

* Bochart. Hieroz. lib. ii. cap. 1. p. 601. 

f Mishn, tit. Pesachim, cap. ii. sect. vi. torn. ii. p. 141, edit. Surenhus. 
Their opinion is discussed at large by Bochart, Hierozoic. lib. ii. cap. 1. 
Oper. torn. ii. p. 603 — 609. 



(HAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



471 



charoseth, and make to be a memorial of the clay in which 
their fathers laboured in the land of Egypt.* Some imagine 
this was the sauce in which our Saviour dipped the sop that 
he gave to Judas; John xiii. 26. 

It was farther prescribed, that they should eat the flesh of 
the lamb without breaking any of his bones; Exod. xii. 46. 
This the later Jews understand, not of the lesser bones, but 
only of the greater, which had marrow in them.f Thus was 
this rite also intended to denote their being in haste, not 
having time to break the bones and suck out the marrow. % 
But it had likewise a typical meaning, of which we shall have 
occasion to take notice hereafter. 

7thly. It was ordered, that nothing of the paschal lamb 
should remain till the morning ; but, if it was not all eaten, it 
should be consumed by tire; Exod. xii. 10. The same law 
was extended to all eucharistical sacrifices, Levit. xxii. 30; 
no part of which was to be left or set by, lest it should be 
corrupted, or converted to any profane or common use. An 
injunction which was designed, no doubt, to maintain the 
honour of sacrifices, and teach the Jews to treat with reve- 
rence whatever was consecrated more especially to the service 
of God. 

As to the first paschal sacrifice, it was the more necessary 
that it should all be eaten or consumed that night, as the 
Israelites were to march out of Egypt early the next morning. 
Otherwise they would have been obliged, either to submit to 
the inconvenience of carrying the remainder of it along with 
them, or to the disagreeable circumstance of leaving it behind 
them, to the contempt of the Egyptians. Moreover, this law 
with respect to sacrifices might be made so comprehensive and 
general, on the same account that induced Hezekiah to break 
in pieces the brazen serpent, 2 Kings xviii. 4: that is, to 
prevent the abuse of such relics to superstitious uses, and to 
discountenance the custom of the heathen idolaters, who re- 
served some part of their sacrifices for any purposes they 
thought proper; as Herodotus § informs us concerning the 

* Maimon. de Solenn. Pasch. cap. vii. sect. xi. p. 889 ; Crenii Fasc. Sept, 
f Vid. Bochart. Hierozoic. lib. ii. cap. 1. Oper. torn. ii. p. 609. 
t Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xlvi. p. 483, Basil. 1629. 
§ Herodot. Clio, cap. cxxxii, p. 55, edit. Gronov. 



472 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK Ell. 



ancient Persians, and as seems to be intimated in the sixth 
chapter of the apocryphal book of Baruch, where the priests 
are said " to sell and abuse the things that were sacrificed to 
idols; and in like manner their wives laid up part thereof 
in salt;" ver. 28. From whence we may naturally derive 
the like superstitious custom of some women among Chris- 
tians, who procure and lay up some part of the bread which 
has been used in the Lord's supper, to cure their children of 
the whooping cough. 

8thly. It was enjoined the Israelites at the first passover, 
that they should keep in their own houses all that night, " and 
none of them should go out of the door of his house till the 
morning," lest they should be exposed to the destroying angel ; 
Exod. xii. 22, 23. We are not to suppose the angel could 
not have distinguished an Israelite from an Egyptian, if he 
had met him in the street; but they were hereby intended to 
be instructed, that their safety lay in being under the protec- 
tion of the blood of the lamb, which was sprinkled upon the 
door-posts of their houses, as an emblem and type of spiritual 
salvation by the blood of Christ. This rite, however, was pe- 
culiar to the first passover, and not observed in succeeding 
ages ; otherwise, Christ and his apostles would not have gone 
to the mount of Olives the same evening on which they had 
been eating the passover; Matt. xxvi. 30. 

Having thus considered the rites of the passover, we are, 

3dly. To inquire into the signification of them. 

That the passover had a typical reference to Christ, we 
learn from the apostle's calling him "our passover;" 1 Cor. 
v. 7. Godwin has drawn out a catalogue of thirteen articles, 
in which this type resembles its antitype, and a larger and 
more particular one may be found in the chapter de Paschate 
of Witsius's CEconomia Faderis, under four general heads : 
the first respecting the person of Christ ; the second, his suf- 
ferings; the third, the fruits and effects of them; and the way 
in which we are to obtain an interest in these fruits and effects. 
We shall briefly select a few of the particulars under each of 
these heads. 

1st. The person of Christ was typified by the paschal lamb. 
On which account, as well as in respect to the lamb of the 
daily sacrifice, he is often represented under the emblem of a 



CHAP. IV.] 



THE PASSOVER. 



473 



lamb: " Behold the Lamb of God," saith John the Baptist; 
John i. 29. 36. The fitness and propriety of this type or 
emblem consists, partly in some natural properties belonging 
to a lamb, and partly in some circumstances peculiar to the 
paschal lamb. A lamb being, perhaps, the least subject to 
choler of any animal in the brute creation, was a very proper 
emblem of our Saviour's humility and meekness, and of his 
inoffensive behaviour, Matt. xi. 29 ; for he, by whose precious 
blood we were redeemed, was " a Lamb without blemish and 
without spot/' 1 Pet. i. 19 ; and likewise of his exemplary 
patience and submission to his Father's will under all his suf- 
ferings, and in the agony of death ; for though he was " op- 
pressed and afflicted^ yet he opened not his mouth Isa.liii. 7. 
By his almighty power he could have delivered himself out of 
the hands of his enemies, as he had done on former occasions, 
Luke iv. 29,30; John viii. 59; but behold the lion of the 
tribe of Judah now transformed into a lamb, by his obedience 
to his Father's will, and compassion to the souls of men. 

There were, also, some circumstances peculiar to the paschal 
lamb, which contributed to its fitness and propriety as a type 
and emblem of Christ : such as its being ordered to be free 
from all blemish and natural defect, that it might the better 
represent the immaculate Son of God, who was made without 
sin, and never did any iniquity, Heb. vii. 26; that it was to 
be taken out of the flock, therein representing that divine 
person, who, in order to his being made a sacrifice for our 
sins, did first become one of us, by taking our flesh and blood, 
and " was made in all things like to his brethren;" chap. ii. 
14. 17. 

The paschal lamb was to be a male of the first year, when 
the flesh was in the highest state of perfection for food ; more 
fitly to represent the " child that was to be born," " the son 
that was to be given" (Isa. ix. 6) to us, and the excellency of 
the sacrifice he was to offer for us, after he had lived a short 
life among men. Once more: 

The paschal lamb was to be taken out of the flock four days 
before it was sacrificed. This circumstance, if we understand 
it of such prophetic days as are mentioned in the fourth chap- 
ter of Ezekiel, is perfectly applicable to Christ, who left his 



474 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 1 1 J . 



mother's house and family, and engaged publicly in his office 
as a Saviour, four years before his death. 

2dly. The sufferings and death of Christ were also typified 
by the paschal lamb in various particulars. For instance, that 
lamb was to be killed " by the whole assembly of the con- 
gregation of Israel," Exod. xii. 6; and so the whole estate of 
the Jews, the priests, scribes, elders, rulers, and the populace 
in general, conspired in the death of Christ (compare Mark 
xiv. 43, with Luke xxiii. 13). The paschal lamb was to be 
killed by the effusion of its blood, as pointing out the manner 
of Christ's death, in which there was an effusion of blood on 
the cross. It was to be roasted with fire, as representing its 
antitype enduring on our account the fierceness of God's 
anger, which is said to ''burn like fire :" Psalm lxxxix. 46; 
Jer. iv. 4. Hence that complaint of our suffering Saviour in 
the prophecy concerning him in the twenty-second Psalm : 
f My heart is like wax, it is melted in the midst of my 
bowels; my strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my 
tongue cleaveth to my jaws;" ver. 14, 15. 

There was, farther, a remarkable correspondence between 
the type and the antitype, with respect to the place and time 
in which each was killed as a sacrifice. The place was the 
same as to both; namely, " the place which the Lord should 
choose to put his name there," which, from the reign of David, 
was at Jerusalem : and the time was also the same ; for Christ 
suffered his agonies on the same evening on which the pass- 
over was celebrated; and his death the next day, between 
the two evenings, according to the most probable interpreta- 
tion of that phrase, namely, between noon and sun-set. 

3dly. Several of the happy fruits and consequences of the 
death of Christ were remarkably typified by the sacrifice of 
the paschal lamb; such as protection and salvation by his 
blood, of which the sprinkling of the door-posts with the 
blood of the lamb, and the safety which the Israelites by that 
means enjoyed from the plague that spread through all the 
families of the Egyptians, was a designed and illustrious em- 
blem. It is in allusion to this type, that the blood of Christ 
is called " the blood of sprinkling:" 1 Pet. i. 2; Heb. 
xii. 24. 



CHAP. IV.] 



IHE PASSOVER. 



475 



Immediately upon the Israelites eating the first passover, 
they were delivered from their Egyptian slavery, and restored 
to full liberty, of which they had been deprived for many 
years ; and such is the fruit of the death of Christ, in a spi- 
ritual and much nobler sense, to all that believe in him ; for 
he hath thereby " obtained eternal redemption for us," and 
" brought us into the glorious liberty of the children of God :" 
Heb. ix. 12; Rom. viii. 21. 

4thly. The ways and means by which we are to obtain an 
interest in the blessed fruits of the sacrifice of Christ, were 
also represented by lively emblems in the passover ; namely, 
by the sprinkling of the blood of the lamb on the door-posts, 
and by eating the flesh of it. The door-posts may be under- 
stood to signify the heart of man, which is the gate, or door, 
by which the King of glory is to enter, Psalm xxiv. 7 ; and 
which is as manifest in the sight of God as the very doors of 
our houses are to any one that passes by them ; 1 Sam. xvi. 7. 
The sprinkling of the blood on the door-posts may therefore 
signify the purifying of the heart by the grace of Christ, which 
he purchased for us by his blood. This seems to be the 
apostle's allusion in the following expression : " Having your 
hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience;" Heb. x. 22. 

By eating the flesh of the lamb we have no difficulty to 
understand faith in Jesus Christ, since Christ himself has ex- 
pressed saving faith in him by the metaphor of eating his 
flesh, propably in reference to the passover ; John vi. 53. 

It is worthy of our notice, that the lamb was to be roasted 
whole, and was to be all eaten, and none of it left; which 
may fitly signify, that, in order to our obtaining the benefits 
of Christ's sacrifice, we must receive him, submit to him, and 
trust upon him in all his characters and offices, as our prophet, 
our priest, and our king ; nor are we to expect, that he will 
redeem and save us from the wrath to come, if we will not at 
present have him to reign over us. 

The passover was to be eaten with bitter herbs; which, 
besides its being an intended memorial of the afflictions of the 
Israelites in Egypt, may fitly signify, that repentance for sin 
must accompany faith in Christ; and also, that, if we are par- 
takers of the benefits of Christ's sufferings, we must expect, 
and be content, to be in some measure partakers likewise of 



476 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



his sufferings. To this purpose the apostle speaks of " the 
fellowship of his sufferings," Phil.iii. 10; and elsewhere saith, 
"that if we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him;" 
2 Tim. ii. 12. 

Tjie passover was also to be eaten with unleavened bread, 
which St. Paul interprets to signify sincerity and purity of 
heart, in opposition to malice, wickedness, and falsehood ; 
and which must necessarily accompany faith in Christ in order 
to his being our passover, that is, our protector from the wrath 
of God, and our redeemer from spiritual bondage and misery ; 
1 Cor. v. 7, 8. 

It was farther ordered, that in eating the paschal lamb they 
should "not break a bone of it;" a circumstance in which 
there was a remarkable correspondence between the type and 
the antitype; John xix. 33. 36. 

Perhaps there is more fancy than judgment in that mystical 
interpretation which some have put on this circumstance, who 
by the bones understand those secrets of God, or those hard 
and difficult things in the divine counsels, which we are not 
able to comprehend, and which we should, therefore, be hum- 
bly content to be ignorant of, without too curiously and 
anxiously searching into them, according to the advice of 
Moses : " Secret things belong to the Lord our God ; but 
those which are revealed, to us and to our children for ever, 
that we may do all the words of this law;" Deut.xxix. 29. 

None, who were legally unclean and polluted, might eat 
the passover, which may farther hint to us, that purity and 
holiness are necessary and incumbent on all that would par- 
take of the benefit of Christ's sacrifice ; for " what fellowship 
hath righteousness with unrighteousness? what communion 
hath light with darkness? what concord hath Christ with 
Belial?" 2 Cor. vi. 14, 15. 

The Israelites were to eat their first passover in the habit 
and posture of travellers, which, in the mystical sense, may 
signify, that such as enter into covenant with God, through 
Christ, must be resolved upon, and ready to go forth to, 
every duty to which he calls them. They are not to look on 
this world as their home ; but, remembering that they are tra- 
velling toward heaven, they are to bear that blessed world 
much upon their thoughts, and to be diligent in preparing for 



CHAP. IV. J FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD. 



477 



their entrance into it. To this purpose are we exhorted " to 
gird up the loins of our minds and to be sober;" to "stand, 
having our loins girded about with truth ;" and, " as pilgrims 
and strangers, to abstain from fleshly lusts which war .against 
the soul:" 1 Pet. i. 13; Eph. vi. 14; 1 Pet. ii. 11. In all 
these expressions there seems to be some reference to the 
habit and posture of the Israelites at the first passover. 

They were to eat the passover in haste ; and thus we must 
" flee for refuge to lay hold on the hope set before us," Heb. 
vi. 18; must not delay and trifle, but " give diligence to make 
our calling and election sure," 2 Pet. i. 10; for the kingdom 
of heaven is said to " suffer violence, and the violent take it 
by force;" Matt. xi. 12. 

In the last place, the Israelites were to eat the passover, 
each family in their own house; and none might go out of the 
house any more that night, lest the destroying angel should 
meet and kill him. By the houses may be understood the 
church of Christ, in which only we are to expect communion 
with him and salvation by him ; and having entered into it, 
we must not go out again, lest we meet with the doom of 
apostates (see Heb. vi. 4 — 6; x. 39; 2 Pet. ii. 20, 21), which 
is dreadful beyond description.* 

Of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. 

Having treated pretty largely of the passover, we proceed 
to the feast of unleavened bread, which immediately fol- 
lowed it, and was kept seven days, from the fifteenth of the 
month Nisan to the twenty-first, inclusive ; as appears from 
the two following passages ; the first from the book of Exodus : 
" In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, at 
even, ye shall eat unleavened bread, until the one-and-twen- 
tieth day of the month at even;" chap. xii. 18. Again, from 

* Besides Witsius, see Mather on the Types, p. 521 — 530, Dublin, 
1685. 

On the subject of the passover in general, with the rest of the authors 
already quoted, see Lightfoot, in his Temple Service, chap. xii. — xiv. ; 
and Spencer, De Legibus Hebraeor. lib. ii. cap. iv. torn. i. p. 293 — 310. In 
Witsii (Econom. Foederis, is a good abridgment of what Bochari hath said 
on the subject. 



478 



JEWISH 



ANTIQU ITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



the book of Numbers : " In the fourteenth day of the first 
month is the passover of the Lord ; and in the fifteenth day of 
this month is the feast ; seven days shall unleavened bread be 
eaten; in the first day shall be an holy convocation;" chap, 
xxviii. 16, 17. When, therefore, it is said in the sixteenth 
chapter of Deuteronomy, " Six days shalt thou eat unlea- 
vened bread, and on the seventh shall be a solemn assembly," 
ver. 8, it cannot be meant that they were to use unleavened 
bread six days only; but that having eaten it six days, they 
should conclude the festival on the seventh with a solemn as- 
sembly, continuing to eat unleavened bread on this day, as 
they had done on the six preceding. The Samaritan text 
and the Septuagint read likewise in the thirteenth chapter of 
Exodus, " Six days shalt thou eat unleavened bread," ver. 6, 
and not seven, as it is in the Hebrew copy and the Targum. 

The very day of the passover, viz. the fourteenth of Nisan, 
is called the first day of unleavened bread, both by St. Mat- 
thew and St. Mark: Matt. xxvi. 17; Mark xiv. 12: whereas, 
according to the passage before cited from the book of Num- 
bers, the fifteenth day of the month being said to be the first 
day of the feast, that is, of unleavened bread, the day of the 
passover was the day before the first day of unleavened bread. 
Some, therefore, suppose, that irpwTv is put by the evangelists 
for Trporepa, as it is in the first chapter of St. John, where 
John the Baptist says, " He that comes after me," irpuroq jxov 
rjv, that is, TTpoTtpog, " was before me;" ver. 30. Thus wpwrv 
ripspa to)v aZvji(s)v should be rendered, not " the first day of 
the feast," but " the day before the feast of unleavened 
bread. " # I apprehend, however, there is no need, in order 
to solve the difficulty, to have recourse to this more unusual 
meaning of the word -rrpo^Tog; for these two feasts, the passover 
and that of unleavened bread, though distinct in themselves, 
yet followed close upon one another, and being united into 
one continued festival for eight days together, hence the name 
of either of them came to be used for both. The feast of un- 
leavened bread is called the passover by St. Luke, chap. xxii. 
1 ; and why then may not the feast of the passover be called 
the feast of unleavened bread by St. Matthew and St. Mark, 
especially since the passover also was eat with unleavened 
* Reland. Antiq. part iv. sect. iii. p. 456, 3d edit. 1717. 



CHAP. IV.] FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD. 479 

bread ; and this, notwithstanding the feast of unleavened 
bread, properly so called, did not begin till the next day, at 
least not till the evening of the paschal day? For it must be 
remembered, the Jews celebrated their sabbath, and all sacred 
festivals, from evening to evening. This, indeed, gives us the 
hint of another solution, which is espoused by some, namely, 
that the paschal day is called the first day of unleavened 
bread, because the feast of unleavened bread began on the 
evening of that day.* But the former solution is, I think, 
the more satisfactory. 

During the whole continuance of this festival they might 
not eat any leavened bread, nor so much as have it in their 
houses; Exod. xii. 15. 18, 19. Care, therefore, must be 
taken, before the feast began, to " purge out the old leaven," 
as the apostle, in allusion to this rite, expresses it; 1 Cor. v. 7. 
Concerning this matter the modern Jews are superstitiously 
exact and scrupulous. The master of the family makes a 
diligent search into every hole and crevice throughout the 
house, lest any crumb of leavened bread should remain in it, 
and that not by the light of the sun or moon, but of a candle. 
And in order that this exactness may not appear altogether 
superfluous and ridiculous, care is taken to conceal some scraps 
of leavened bread in some corner or other, the discovery of 
which occasions mighty joy. This search, nevertheless, strict 
as it is, does not give him entire satisfaction. After all, he 
beseeches God, that all the leavened bread which is in the 
house, as well what he has found, as what he has not, may 
become like the dust of the earth, and be reduced to nothing. 
And as they are thus superstitiously careful in purging out the 
old leaven, so they are no less exact and scrupulous about 
making their bread for the feast, lest there should be any fer- 
mentation in it, or any thing like leaven mixed with it. For 
instance: the corn of which it is made must not be carried to 
the mill on the horse's bare back, lest the heat of the horse 
should make it ferment ; the sack in which it is put must be 
carefully examined, lest there should be any remainder of old 
meal in it, which might prove like leaven to the new meal ; 
the dough must be made in a place not exposed to the sun, 
lest the heat of the sun should make it ferment; and it must 



* Reland. ubi supra, p. 455, 456. 



480 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK Iff. 



be put into the oven immediately after it is made, lest it should 
ferment itself.* 

From the Jews, probably, the Roman Catholics have bor- 
rowed many superstitious niceties about the corn and dough, 
of which they make their hosts. 

The punishment to be inflicted on any who neglected to 
cleanse their houses from leaven against the feast, is, in the 
judgment of the rabbies, scourging.f But the penalty for 
eating leavened bread during the festival, is, according to the 
law of God, to be " cut off from the congregation of Israel," 
Exod. xii. 19; the same punishment which is threatened to 
the neglect of circumcision, Gen. xvii. 14; and to several 
other trespasses, both against the moral and ceremonial laws ; 
as to wilful sinning in contempt of the divine authority, Numb, 
xv. 30, 31; to profaning the sabbath, Exod. xxxi. 14; to the 
eating of fat and blood, Lev. vii. 25. 27 ; and to several other 
violations of the law. But what this rro chereth, as the rab- 
bies call it, from JVQ charath, secuit, or cutting off, signified, 
is rather differently conjectured by various writers, than cer- 
tainly determined by any. Some make it to signify excom- 
munication; others death, to be inflicted by the magistrate; 
others death by the immediate hand of God. Others say 
it was making a man childless, so that his family and his 
name perished in Israel. Maimonides would have it be 
the extinction both of the soul and body, or perishing like 
the brutes; and Abarbanel, the loss of future happiness. J 
But hardly any one of these senses will suit all the cases 
in which this punishment is threatened. It could not 
mean excommunication from the church of Israel when it 
is threatened to the neglect of circumcision, because no per- 
son was a member of that church till he was circumcised. 
Nor could it mean death to be immediately inflicted by the 
hand of God, since the Israelites neglected circumcision with 
impunity during their journey in the wilderness, for forty 

* See Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xvii. p. 394 — 398, 3d edit. Basil. 
1661 ; and Maimon. de Solennitate Paschatis, cap. ii. — v. p. 843 — 877, 
Crenii Fascicul. Septimi. 

t Maimon. de Solennitate Paschatis, cap. i. p. 838 — 843, Crenii Fascicul. 
Septimi. 

% Abarbanel. Dissert, de Poena Excidii, ad calcem Buxtorf. Dissert, de 
Sponsalibus et Divortiis, where these T several opinions are examined. 



CHAP. IV.] FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD. 481 

years together; Josh. v. 5. Nor could it signify the same 
punishment, when threatened to the neglect of the passoyer, 
since that ordinance was shamefully neglected during several 
wicked reigns of the Jewish kings, till Hezekiah, and after 
him Josiah, revived it; 2 Chron. xxx. xxxv. It is most pro- 
bable, that rHD chereth is a general name for several sorts of 
punishment, which were to be determined by the nature of 
the offence. Sometimes it seems to import punishment by the 
judge, and sometimes by the more immediate hand of God. # 

The first and last days of the feast of unleavened bread 
were to be kept as sabbaths, holy, and free from all servile 
work, except dressing of victuals, which was unlawful on the 
weekly sabbath (compare Exod. xii. 16, with chap. xxxv. 3); 
and they were likewise to be solemnized by a holy convocation. 
But we find no precept concerning the keeping the five inter- 
mediate days, besides their abstaining from leavened bread, 
and offering certain sacrifices on each of them ; Numb, xxviii. 
1 7 — 25. However, the rabbies have abundantly supplied these 
defects by their comments ; they allow the time to be spent in 
mirth, and all lawful recreation ; and some of them allow 
works of necessity to be performed, while others think it un- 
lawful even to take up a straw, or to pick their teeth .f 

One remarkable offering that was to be made at this feast 
was the sheaf of the first fruits of the harvest; Lev. xxiii. 10, 
11. For though this feast was kept soon after the vernal 
equinox, yet, in that warm climate, the barley, which was 
usually sown in November, became ripe at this season. But 
if it happened that the harvest was not forward enough to be 
fit to cut at the middle of Nisan, they intercalated a month, 
which they called Veadar, and the next Nisan, and so put off 
the festival a month longer.^ 

The day on which this offering was made, is said to be 
" the morrow after the sabbath ;" Lev. xxiii. 11. By which, 
though some have understood the weekly sabbath that fell in 
the time of this festival, yet the Jews more generally under- 
stand by it the first day of the feast, according to which sense 

* Mr. Selden hath treated largely on the chereth, De Jure Nat. et Gent, 
lib. vii. cap. ix. and De Syned. lib. i. cap. vi. 

f See these and various other particulars in Buxtorf s Synag. Judaic, 
cap. xix. p. 430 — 433, 3d edit. 

X See Lightfoot, Horae Hebr. Matt. xii. 1, 

2 i 



482 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



the Septuagint renders it rrj twavpiov ttjc Trpdrrrig, "the morrow 
after the first." The Targum of Onkelos renders it, "after 
the feast day and Josephus says expressly, " ttj cevrepa ruv 
aZvfiGJv ft/jLtpa," &c., on the second day of unleavened bread, 
which is the sixteenth of Nisan, they take of the fruits of the 
harvest which they have not touched before ; and esteeming 
it their duty, first to pay due honour to God, from whom they 
have received their liberal supply, they offer him the first 
fruits of the barley.* 

The rabbies inform us, that this sheaf was gathered and pre- 
pared for the offering with a great deal of ceremony, which, as 
we have no account of it in Scripture, we pass over in silence.f 

The moral signification of this title, the offering of the first- 
fruits, was undoubtedly to be an acknowledgment of his good- 
ness " who gives rain, both the former and the latter rain, in 
its season, and reserves to men the appointed weeks of har- 
vest/' Jer. v. 24; and also of his right to, and propriety in, 
those bounties of his providence, in consequence of which he 
may bestow, or take them away, as he pleases, Hos. ii. 8, 9 ; 
and likewise, to teach them to look up to God for his blessing 
to render their earthly enjoyments and possessions profitable 
and delightful ; 1 Tim. iv. 4, 5. 

There might also be a typical signification of this rite, as 
referring to the resurrection of Christ, whose sacrifice and 
death had been just before represented by that of the paschal 
lamb, and which is compared by our Lord himself to corn 
falling into the ground and dying, after which it springs up 
and brings forth fruit; John xii. 24. Accordingly, the apostle 
saith, 1 Cor. xv. 20, as it should seem in reference to this 
type, f Now is Christ risen from the dead, and is become the 
first-fruits of them that slept.";); 

* Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. x. sect. v. p. 177, 178, edit. Haverc; 
see also Lightfoot. Horae Hebraic. Act. vii. 1. 

f See Ainsworth on Levit. xxiii. 10 ; Lightfoot's Temple Service, chap, 
xiv. sect. ii. ; Outram de Sacrificiis, lib. i. cap. viii. sect. vi. p. 87, London, 
1677; Mishn. tit. Sotah, cap. vii. sect. iii. not. ; Wagenseil. torn. iii. p. 259, 
260, edit. Surenhus. ; et tit. Menachoth, cap. x. cum not. Bartenor. ; et 
Maimon. torn. v. 

I On the sheaf of the first-fruits, see also Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. iii. 
sect. viii. p. 464 — 466; Hottingeri Annot. in Godwin, lib. iii. cap. v. sect, 
iii. not. iii. Francof. 1716. On the feast of unleavened bread, see the 
author* before referred to on the passover. 



CHAPTER V, 



OF THE FEAST OF PENTECOST. 

The pentecost was the second of the three grand festivals 
in the ecclesiastical year, at which all the males were to appear 
before the Lord at the national altar. 

It is called by several names in the Old Testament ; as the 
feast of weeks, the feast of harvest, and the day of the first- 
fruits. In the New Testament it is styled pentecost; and the 
rabbies have other names for it, calling it " the day of giving 
the law," and nity gnatsereth, the word which we render 
*' a solemn assembly." 

1st. It is called " the feast of weeks," Exod. xxxiv. 22, 
because it was celebrated seven weeks, or a week of weeks, 
after the passover ; or rather, after the first day of the feast of 
unleavened bread ; for the computation of the seven weeks 
began with the second day of that feast, and the next day 
after the seven weeks were completed was the feast of pen- 
tecost. Thus it is said in Leviticus, " Ye shall count unto 
you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye 
brought the sheaf of the wave-offering, seven sabbaths shall be 
complete, even to the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall 
ye number fifty days ;" chap, xxiii. 15, 16. By the seven 
sabbaths here mentioned, we are to understand seven weeks ; 
and so it is rendered in the Targum and in the Septuagint ; in 
which sense we find the word aafifiarov used in the New Tes- 
tament : the Pharisee in the parable saith, vtigtevoj £>tc rov <ra/3- 
fiarov, " I fast twice a-week that is, on the second and fifth 
days, on which fasting was recommended by the tradition of 
the elders ; and which were accordingly kept every week as 
fasts by the devout Jews. And in the first verse of the twenty- 

2 i 2 



484 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[liOOK III. 



eighth chapter of Matthew, fiiav crafificiTiov evidently signifies 
the "first day of the week." 

The rabbies lay great stress upon the precept to count the 
seven sabbaths, or weeks. And Maimonides remarks, that it 
was to the honour of this festival that they were obliged to 
count the days of its approach from the preceding passover, as 
a man, expecting his best and most faithful friend at an ap- 
pointed time, is accustomed to number the days and hours till 
his arrival.* Accordingly, the modern Jews make an act of 
devotion of counting the days from the passover to the pente- 
cost, beginning the computation with a solemn prayer or be- 
nediction, in this form: " Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, 
the Lord of the world, who hast sanctified us with thy pre- 
cepts, and commanded us to number the days of the har- 
vest; and this is the first day." Thus they go on with their 
prayer, or benediction, till the seventh day ; then they add, 
" Now there is one week and so they proceed with the 
same act of devotion every day to the evening of the pen- 
tecost. f 

This counting is, in some places, performed publicly in the 
synagogue. But whether it be thus performed or not, every 
master of a family is obliged to do it every evening at 
home. J 

Now since there were seven weeks complete between the 
first day of the feast of unleavened bread and the day of pen- 
tecost, it is made matter of inquiry, on what day of the week 
that remarkable pentecost fell, when the Holy Ghost was shed 
forth on the apostles ; which is said to have been ev rw trvfi- 
Tr\r)pov<T%at rrjv fi/Aspav rrjc 7Tf vrr/Kocrrjc, the meaning of which 
is ambiguous, as it may either signify, when the day of pentecost 
was fulfilled and over ; or, as it is rendered in our English 
version, " when it was fully come;" Acts ii. 1. The former 
sense is most agreeable to the common meaning of the word 
irXripou), and the text is accordingly rendered in the Italian ver- 
sion, " when the day of pentecost was fully gone." This 
sense Dr. Lightfoot prefers, and not without reason : § for 

* Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xliii. p. 471. 
f Hottinger. in Godwin, lib. iii. cap. v. sect. v. p. 575, 576. 
I See Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xx. p. 441, 3d edit. 
§ Horse Hebr. in loc. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE PENTECOST. 



485 



since Christ ate his last passover on the same day with the rest 
of the Jews, as we have already proved, namely, on the four- 
teenth of Nisan, which was Thursday; the next day, on 
which he was crucified, must be the first day of the feast of 
unleavened bread ; therefore, the sixteenth day, the Saturday, 
was the first day of the seven weeks between that and the 
pentecost; consequently the fiftieth day, or the morrow after 
the seventh sabbath or week, which was the day of pente- 
cost, must fall on the Saturday, or the Jewish sabbath. 

The Doctor apprehends no reason can be assigned for " the 
disciples being all with one accord in one place," on the day 
when the Holy Ghost descended upon them, more reasonable 
and probable, than that they were assembled for the celebra- 
tion of the Lord's day; which must be, therefore, the next 
day after the pentecost. Upon which he farther observes, 
that our Lord, in fulfilling several types by which he was re- 
presented, did not confine himself to the day of the type, but 
deferred the accomplishment to the day following. It was not 
upon the very day of the passover, but on the ensuing day, 
that " Christ our passover was sacrificed for us ;" 1 Cor. v. 7. 
It was not on the day that the sheaf of the first-fruits was 
offered, but the next day, that Christ became the " first-fruits 
of them that slept;" 1 Cor. xv. 20. In like manner he sup- 
poses the descent of the Holy Ghost was not on the day of 
pentecost, but when it was gone, or the next day after. 
Nevertheless, our English version, " when the day of pen- 
tecost was fully come," is supported by the use of the word 
7rXr?joow in several places of the Septuagint, as Dr. Hammond 
hath fully shown .* Thus in the evangelist Luke, ore e-rrXrid- 
§r\(Tav riiuepai oktw, which we render, " when eight days were 
accomplished for circumcising the child," Luke ii. 21, must 
signify, not when the eighth day was over, but when it was 
come, for on that day, according to the law, circumcision was 
to be performed ; Levit. xii. 2, 3. Supposing, then, it was 
the very day of pentecost when the disciples were thus as- 
sembled, and the Holy Ghost came upon them, it might 
nevertheless be the first day of the week, or the Lord's day ; 
for as the Jews reckoned all their sacred and festival days 
* See Hammond in loc. 



486 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK HI. 



from the evening, so we have the testimony both of Rabbi So- 
lomon and Maimonides,* that they began the computation of 
the seven weeks from the evening of the sixteenth of Nisan.f 
Insomuch, that the Saturday, on which our Saviour lay in the 
sepulchre, was not one of the forty-nine days which made se- 
ven weeks complete ; but that evening and the first day of the 
week, on which Christ rose from the dead, made the first day 
of the first week ; and, consequently, Friday evening and Sa- 
turday were the forty-ninth, and the Lord's day was the fif- 
tieth, or the day of pentecost. Thus it appears, that accord- 
ing to the manner in which the Scribes computed the seven 
weeks, the day of pentecost that year, when the Holy Ghost 
descended upon the apostles, was the first day of the week. 

According to the computation of the Baithusians and Kar- 
raites, the day of pentecost always fell on the first day of the 
week; for by " the sabbath on the morrow after which the 
sheaf was offered/' and the computation of the seven weeks 
began, they understand the weekly sabbath (or the sabbath of 
the creation, as the Scribes call it), which fell in the paschal 
week. So that, according to them, the first day of the week 
was always the first day of the forty-nine days or seven weeks ; 
and, consequently, the fiftieth day, or pentecost, was always 
the first day of the week.J 

2dly. It was called " the feast of harvest," Exod. xxiii. 16, 
on the following account, according to the learned Mr. Jo- 
seph Mede, because, as the harvest began at the passover, so 
it ended at pentecost. § Bochart is of the same opinion, who 
saith, that as about the time of the passover the sickle was 

* R. Solom. cited by Meyer in not. ad Megillath Taanith, cap. i. p. 7> 
ad calcem Tractat. de Tempor. et Festis Hebraeorum ; Maimon. de Sacri- 
ficiis Jugibus, cap. vii. sect. xxii. p. 477, Crenii Fascic. Sexti. 

f See also Megillath Taanith, ubi supra, p. 4 — 6. 

I R. Obad. de Bartenora in Mishn. tit. Chagigah, cap. ii. sect. iv. p. 41 9; 
Megillath Taanith, ubi supra. See the dispute concerning this computation 
in Meyer, de Tempor. et Festis Hebrseor. part ii. cap. xiii. sect. xxi. — xxiv. 
p. 295 — 297; Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. iv. sect. iii. iv. p. 474 — 476, 3d 
edit.; Liber Cozri, part iii. sect. xli. p. 217, cum not.; Buxtorf. in loc. 
p. 218, 219; Lightfoot, Horse Hebr. Act. ii. 1; Selden, de Anno Civili 
Judseorum, cap. vii. 

§ Mede's Diatrib. disc, xlviii, p, 269 of his Works. 



CHAP. V.] 



THE PENTECOST. 



487 



brought out for cutting the corn, so about pentecost it was 
laid up again, the harvest being entirely finished.* And it is 
likewise the sentknent of Godwin. But it doth not seem to 
be justly founded; for at this feast the first-fruits of their 
wheat harvest were brought and offered to God; on which 
account it was called u the feast of harvest," as that name is 
explained : " the feast of harvest, the first-fruits of thy la- 
bour, which thou hast sown in thy field. " Now as the first- 
fruits of the barley harvest were offered at the very beginning 
of it, as we have shown in the last chapter, so it is reasonable 
to suppose, the first-fruits of the wheat harvest were likewise 
offered at the beginning of it, and not delayed till it was over, 
and all brought into the barns. Hence, 

3dly. Another name of this feast is, " the day of the first- 
fruits," as it is called in the twenty-eighth chapter of the book 
of Numbers, ver. 26, because on that day they were to " offer 
a new wheat-offering unto the Lord of two loaves of fine 
flour baked with leaven," as we are informed in Leviticus, 
chap, xxiii. 16, 17; and these were to be accompanied with 
animal sacrifices, namely, " seven lambs, without blemish, of 
the first year, and a bullock and two rams for a burnt-offer- 
ing, a kid of the goats for a sin-offering, and two lambs of the, 
first year for a sacrifice of peace-offerings;" ver. 18, 19. 

It may to us seem very strange, that the wheat harvest 
should not begin in Judea till seven weeks after the barley 
harvest; whereas we are accustomed to see them both to- 
gether. It was otherwise in the eastern countries ;f in 
Egypt particularly, the barley, it is said, was smitten with 
the hail, for it was in the ear, whereas the wheat and the rye 
were not smitten, for they were not grown up; Exod. ix» 
31,32. 

It is inquired, why leaven was used in the bread offered at 
pentecost; whereas it was expressly forbidden at the pass- 
over ? 

The rabbies say, because their bread at the passover was 

* Bochart. Hieroz. part i. lib. iii. cap. xiii. Oper. torn. ii. p. 857, edit. 
1712. See also Fuller. Miscell. lib. iii. cap. xi.; apud Criticos Sacros, torn, 
ix. p. 2362, edit. Lond. 

f Vid. Bochart, ubi supra, p. 857, 858., . 



488 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



in commemoration of their sudden departure out of Egypt, 
when they could not stay to have it leavened ; but the loaves 
offered at pentecost were in behalf of the bread which they 
were ordinarily to eat. # 

4thly. This feast is styled in the New Testament TrevTriKoarri, 
that is, the fiftieth ; because it was kept fifty days after the 
passover. Pasor in his Lexicon supposes the word ri/jLtpa to 
be understood, with which the feminine adjective 7T€vr»jKOOTn 
agrees. This, however, would make a sad tautology of the 
expression in the Acts, rrjv r)^pav rrjc 7revTriico<TTr)s, chap. ii. 1. 

5thly. The rabbies call this feast " the day of the giving 
of the law;" for it is the constant opinion of the Jews, that 
on this day the law was given on Mount Sinai, namely, on 
the fiftieth day from their departure out of Egypt.f This is 
collected from the nineteenth chapter of Exodus, in the first 
verse of which it is said, that in the third month (or in the 
third new moon, as the Hebrew word l£Hp chodhesh signifies), 
when the children of Israel were gone forth out of Egypt, the 
same day (that is, the day of the new moon) they came to 
Sinai. Adding, therefore, to this day twenty-nine for the 
last month, and fifteen days of the first montb, it makes forty- 
five from the time of their departure from Egypt to their 
arrival at Sinai. To which if we add the day when Moses 
went up to God in the mount, Exod. xix. 3, and the next 
day when he reported his message from God to the people, 
and returned their answer, ver. 7, 8; and the three days 
more which God gave them to prepare themselves for his 
coming down among them, ver. 1 1 ; there were just fifty days 
from the first passover to the giving the law at Mount Sinai ; 
to which, therefore, according to Maimonides, the institution 
of this feast had a special regard. 

* Abarbanel in Lev. iii., cited by Lightfoot in his Temple Service, chap, 
xiv. sect: iv. 

f Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xliii. p. 471, who makes the 
design of pentecost to be a memorial of the giving of the law. Abar- 
banel, who differs with him as to the design of the institution, admits, never- 
theless, that it was celebrated in the same day on which the law was given. 
See Meyer, De Tempor. et Festis Hebraeor. part ii. cap. xiii. sect. xvi. xvii. 
p. 293, 294. 



CHAP. V.J 



THE PENTECOST. 



489 



6thly. The rabbies again call this feast mity gnatsereth ;* 
the word which we render " solemn assembly," Lev. xxiii. 36; 
Deut. xvi. 8; which, though it is never applied to the pente- 
cost in Scripture, yet they in a manner appropriate it to this 
feast, calling it mity gnatsereth, tear t^oxnv. The reason of 
which might be, as Dr. Lightfoot conjectures, because this 
feast consisted of one solemn day only, whereas the feast of 
the passover and of tabernacles had more.-f- 

The more immediate design of this institution seems to 
have been, that they might thankfully acknowledge the good- 
ness of God in giving them the fruits of the earth, and beg his 
blessing on the bounties of his providence, by their offering 
the first-fruits of their harvest to him ; and it doubtless had a 
typical reference to the first-fruits of the Holy Spirit, and of 
converts to Christ, after the erection of the gospel kingdom, 
by means of Peter's preaching on the day of pentecost.J 

* See the Chaldee Paraphrase on Numb, xxviii. 26 ; Mishn. tit. Gnera- 
chin, cap. ii. sect. iii. torn. v. p. 196. See also Reland. Antiq. part iv. 
cap. iv. sect. iii. p. 472 — 474; and Lightfbot's Temple Service, chap. xiv. 
sect. iv. 

f Horae Hebr. Act. ii. 1 . 

X See on the pentecost, Meyer, De Temporibus et Festis Hebrseorum, 
part ii. cap. xiii. ; Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. iv. ; Lightfoot, Horse Hebr. 
Act. ii. 1, and Temple Service, chap, xiv.; Leydekker de Republ. Hebraeor. 
lib. ix. cap. v. 



CHAPTER VI. 



OF THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 

The feast of tabernacles was the third grand festival, at 
which all the male Israelites were to attend at the national 
altar, Deut. xvi. 16. It derived its name from their dwelling 
in tabernacles,* or booths, during its celebration; Lev. xxiii. 
42. It is likewise called the " feast of ingathering in the end 
of the year," Exod. xxiii. 16, because at this season the whole 
harvest, not only of the corn, but also of the vintage and other 
fruits, for which they were to express their thankfulness to 
God, at this feast, was completed; Lev. xxiii. 39. 

It began on the fifteenth day of the month Tisri, the first of 
the civil and the seventh of the ecclesiastical year, and was to 
be celebrated seven days : " The fifteenth day of the seventh 
month shall be the feast of tabernacles for seven days;" Lev. 
xxiii. 34. To which there was also added an eighth day, 
which was to be observed with peculiar solemnity : " Seven 
days shall ye offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord ; on 
the eighth day shall be an holy convocation unto you, and ye 
shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord ; it is a so- 
lemn assembly, and ye shall do no servile work therein;" 
ver. 36. But as the feast of tabernacles is expressly limited 
to seven days, " The fifteenth day of this seventh month shall 
be the feast of tabernacles for seven days unto the Lord," 
ver. 34; during which only they are commanded to dwell in 
tabernacles or booths, ver. 42; this eighth day was not so pro- 
perly a part of the feast of tabernacles, as another distinct 
feast which followed immediately upon it; agreeably to the 
account which is given in the book of Nehemiah, " They kept 
the feast seven days, and on the eighth day was a solemn as- 

* The rabbies say a great deal concerning the form of these tabernacles ; 
see Mishn. tit. Succah, and Surenhusii Tabulae rarissimorum Tabernacu- 
lorum, prefixed to torn, v, 



CHAT. VI.] THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 



491 



scinbly according unto the manner;" chap. viii. 18. The seven 
days are expressly said in Leviticus to have been kept in 
commemoration of their dwelling in tents in the wilderness for 
forty years, chap, xxiii. 42, 43 ; the eighth day, therefore, 
was properly the feast of ingathering, on which they were to 
give thanks for their whole harvest, " after," as it is expressed 
in the book of Deuteronomy, " they had gathered in their 
corn and their wine," chap. xvi. 13 — 16. Indeed, there is no 
mention, in this last passage, of this eighth day, but only of 
the festival of seven days. Nevertheless, these being observed 
on a separate account, namely, to commemorate their dwelling 
in tents in the wilderness, we may conclude, that the rejoicing 
and thanksgiving, enjoined at this festival on account of the 
harvest, were chiefly if not wholly appropriated to the eighth 
day. And it is observable, that they were commanded to 
dwell in booths no longer than the seven days; a circumstance 
which shows, that the eighth day was not observed on the 
same account as the seven preceding. Nevertheless, as the 
names of the feast of the passover, and the feast of unlea- 
vened bread, which immediately followed it, are frequently 
confounded, # so the feast of tabernacles and of ingathering, 
though properly distinct, yet, following close upon one another, 
are sometimes spoken of as one feast, and the name of either 
indifferently applied to both. It was probably the eighth day, 
which is ordered to be kept with the solemnity of a sabbath, 
and not the seventh, concerning which there is no such ap- 
pointment in the law, that is styled by the evangelist John 
" the last and great day of the feast," chap. vii. 37; that is, 
of the feast of tabernacles ; ver. 2. 

The first day of this feast was to be kept as a sabbath, Lev. 
xxiii. 39, and during that and the six following days they were 
to dwell in tents, or booths, made of branches of several sorts 
of trees, which are particularly mentioned, ver. 40. The 
name of the first sort is mn ftf gnets hadhar, which we ren- 
der, " goodly trees." The Jews will have it to mean the 
citron .+ The next is called "ton thamar, or the palm. The 
third is roy gnets gnabhoth, which signifies any thick or 

* See before, chap. iv. p. 478. 

f Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. v. sect, ix.; Hottinger. in Godwin, lib. iii, 
cap. vi, sect. iii. not. iv. p. 581—584. 



492 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



bushy wood; by which the Jews understand the myrtle. The 
last is the willow. But when Nehemiah, upon the revival of 
this feast, directed the people what branches to gather, he 
called some of them by different names, which we render olive 
branches, and pine branches, and myrtle branches ; Neh. viii. 
15. Probably, therefore, the Karraites were right in their 
opinion, that it was not the intention of the law to oblige 
them to use certain trees and no other, but only such as were 
fit for the purpose, and could be most readily procured, in the 
places where they dwelt. Accordingly Moses named such 
trees as were most common in his time, and Nehemiah others 
that were grown more common in his. It appears from the 
passage in Nehemiah, that the booths were to be made of 
these branches ; but this is not expressly declared of the 
boughs mentioned in Leviticus. It is only said, " You shall 
take on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of 
palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the 
brook; and ye shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven 
days." These boughs and branches the Sadducees understand 
to be for making their booths; but the Pharisees, that they 
were to be carried in their hands;* which is the practice of 
the modern Jews to this day. They tie together one branch 
of palm, three branches of myrtle, and one of willow. This 
they carry in their right hands, and in their left they have a 
branch of citron, with its fruit, or at least of pomecitron, when 
they cannot procure such a branch. With these, every day 
of the feast, that is, for seven days, they make a procession in 
their synagogues round their reading desks, as their ancestors 
did round the walls of Jericho, in token of the expected down- 
fal of their enemies.f Under each of these branches a mys- 
tery is comprehended. The palm, inasmuch as it bears an 
insipid fruit, is an emblem of the hypocrite. The myrtle, as it 
has a fragrant smell, although it be barren, resembles those 
who perform good works without the law. The willow is an 
emblem of the wicked, and the citron of the righteous. J They 
also turn about with these branches to the four cardinal points, 

* Reland. Antiq. ubi supra; see Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. x. sect. iv. 
p. 175, edit. Haverc. 

t Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xxi. p. 460, 461. 
% Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xxi. p. 457, 3d edit. 



CHAP. VI.] THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 493 

and shake or push with them each way, and upwards and 
downwards, to drive the devil from them.* While they are 
making this procession, they sing Hosannah ; whence this 
feast is called by the rabbies the Hosannah ; and sometimes 
the branches are called by the same name. On the last day, 
which they call Hosannah Rabbah, or the great Hosannah, 
they make the procession seven times together, in memory of 
the siege of Jericho. The form of the Hosannah in their 
ritual, which they sing on this occasion, is remarkable : et For 
thy sake, O our Creator, Hosannah ; for thy sake, O our Re- 
deemer, Hosannah; for thy sake, O our Seeker, Hosannah;" 
as if they beseeched the blessed Trinity, saith Dr Patrick,f 
to save them, and send them help. This feast is kept with 
the greatest j ollity of any of their festivals, especially on the 
eighth day ; when, according to the law, they were to feast 
and rejoice upon their having gathered in their corn and their 
wine. Hence, in the Talmud, it is often called jn chag, the 
feast, tear £%oxnv : and Philo calls it eoprujv jueytdrrjv, the great- 
est of the feasts; J and hence likewise this Jewish festival 
came to be more taken notice of by the heathens than any 
other. It is probable king Cecrops took from it the hint of 
the law which he ordained at Athens, " that the master of 
every family should after harvest make a feast for his servants, 
and eat together with them, who had taken pains with him in 
tilling his ground ."§ And as this Jewish festival was kept 
at the time of the vintage, or presently after it, when " they 
had gathered in their corn and their wine," it is not unlikely, 
that the heathens borrowed their Bacchanalia from it ; and this 
might lead Plutarch into that egregious mistake, that the 
Jews celebrated this festival to the honour of Bacchus ; for he 
saith in his Symposia, || " that in the time of the vintage the 
Jews spread tables, furnished with all manner of fruits, and 
lived in tabernacles, especially of palm and ivy wreathed to- 
gether, and they call it the feast of tabernacles ;" " and then 
a few days after," saith he (referring, I suppose, to the last day 

* Buxtorf. cap. xx. p. 459. f Patrick on Lev. xxiii. 40. 

X See Wolfii Curse Philolog. in Joh. vii. 37. 

§ Macrob. Saturnal. lib. i. cap. x. p. 231, edit. Gronov. Lugd. Bat. 1670. 
\\ Plutarch. Sympos. lib. iv. prob. v. Oper. torn. ii. p. 671, edit.*Francof. 
1620. 



494 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK Iff. 



of the feast), " they kept another festivity, which openly shows 
it was dedicated to Bacchus ; for they carried boughs of palms, 
&c, in their hands, with which they went into the temple, 
the Levites (who, he fancies, were so called from Ewoc, one 
of the names of Bacchus) going before with instruments of 
music," &c. 

Although only the first and last days of this feast were to be 
kept as sabbaths, there were, nevertheless, peculiar and ex- 
traordinary sacrifices appointed for everyday of it; Numb, 
xxix. 12, et seq. On the first day, " thirteen young bul- 
locks, two rams, and fourteen lambs of the first year," were 
sacrificed ; whereas on the other festivals two bullocks suf- 
ficed; see Numb, xxviii. 11. 19. 27. The next day twelve 
bullocks were sacrificed, and so on, with the decrease of one 
bullock a day, till on the seventh day only seven bullocks 
were offered ; which in all made seventy bullocks. The lambs 
and the rams also were in a double proportion to the number 
sacrificed at any other festival. The doctors give this reason 
for the daily diminution of the number of the bullocks ; the 
whole number, say they, being seventy, was according to the 
languages of the seventy nations of the world ; and the dimi- 
nution of one every day signified, that there should be a gra- 
dual diminution of those nations till all things were brought 
under the government of the Messiah.* Others suppose this 
diminution had a respect to the seventy years of man's age, 
which is daily decaying.f 

For the eighth day, though it was properly a distinct fes- 
tival, and was to be kept with extraordinary solemnity, fewer 
sacrifices were appointed than for any of the foregoing seven. 
On every one of them two rams were offered and fourteen 
lambs; on this day there were but half as many ; and whereas 
seven bullocks were the fewest that were offered on any of 
these days, on this there was only one; Numb. xxix. 36. By 
which, Dr. Patrick saith, God consulted perhaps the weak 
ness of mankind, who naturally grow weary both of the charge 
and labour of such services, when they are long continued ; 
and therefore he made them every day less toilsome and ex- 

* R. Solomon in Numb. xxix. cited by Lightfoot in his Temple Service, 
chap. xvi. sect. i. 

f Abarbanei in Numb. xxix. cited by Lightfoot, ubi supra. 



CHAP. VI.] THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 



495 



pensive ; and put them in mind likewise, that the multitude of 
sacrifices did not procure their acceptance with God, and that 
in length of time they would come to nothing, and be utterly 
abolished, to establish something better in their room.* 

Before we dismiss the ceremonies of this feast, we must not 
forget to mention a very extraordinary one, of which the rab- 
bies inform us, though there is not the least hint of it in the 
law of Moses, notwithstanding he gives a more particular de- 
scription of this feast than of any other ; namely, the drawing 
water out of the pool of Siloam, and pouring of it, mixed with 
wine, on the sacrifice as it lay on the altar.f This they are 
said to have done with such expressions of joy, that it became 
a common proverb, "He that never saw the rejoicing of 
drawing water, never saw rejoicing in all his life." J To this 
ceremony our Saviour is supposed to refer, when " in the last 
day, the great day of the feast, he stood and cried, saying, If 
any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink : he that be- 
lieveth on me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall 
flow rivers of living water," John vii. 37, 38 : thereby calling 
off the people from their carnal mirth, and festive and pomp- 
ous ceremonies, to seek spiritual refreshment for their souls. 
The Jews pretend to ground this custom on the following 
passage of Isaiah, " With joy shall ye draw water out of the 
wells of salvation chap. xii. 3. This libation was performed 
every day of the feast, at the time of the morning sacrifice ;§ but 
the greater part of their rejoicing on that occasion was adjourned 
till evening ; when a wild and ridiculous scene of mirth was 
acted in the court of the temple, by those who were esteemed 
the wise men of Israel, || namely, by the elders and members 
of the Sanhedrim, the rulers of the synagogues, and doctors 
of the schools, and such others as were most honoured for their 

* See Patrick in loc. 

f See this ceremony described in Maimon. de Sacrifices Jugibus, cap. x. 
sect. vii. p. 494, 495; CreniiFascic.Sexti in Annot. Constant. L'Empereur, 
ad cod. Middoth, cap. ii. sect. v. p. 67 — 69, edit. Lugd. Bat. 1730; or in 
Mishn. Surenhus. torn. v. p. 343, 344. 

| Mishn. tit. Succah, cap. v. sect. i. torn. ii. p. 277, edit. Surenhus. 

§ Maimon. ubi supra, sect. vi. 

|| Maimon. in Lulahb. cap. viii. sect. xii. et seq. See the quotations in 
Talmudis Babylonici codex Succah, by Dachs, not. i. ii. ad cap. v. sect. iv. 
p. 451, 452, Traject. ad Rhen. 1726. 



496 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK HI. 



age and piety. All the temple-music played, and these old 
men danced, while the women in the balconies round the court, 
and the men on the ground, were spectators. All the sport 
was to see these venerable fathers of the nation skip and dance, 
clap their hands and sing ; and they who played the fool most 
egregiously, acquitted themselves with most honour; for in 
this they pretend to imitate the example of David, " who 
danced before the Lord with all his might, and said, I will be 
yet more vile than this, and be base in my own sight;" 2 Sam. 
vi. 14. 22. In this manner they spent the greater part of the 
night, till at length two priests sounded a retreat with trum- 
pets. This mad festivity was repeated every evening, except 
on the evening before the sabbath which fell in this festival, 
and on the evening before the last and great day of the feast. 
It seems, these two evenings were accounted too holy for such 
ridiculous gambols.* 

We can be at no loss for a reason, why the feast of inga- 
thering, which was annexed to the feast of tabernacles, was 
celebrated at this season of the year, when the vintage, as 
well as the corn harvest, was newly finished ; in respect to 
which the feast is said, in the book of Exodus, to be " in the 
end of the year," chap, xxiii. 16, though it was not celebrated 
till three weeks after the new civil year began ; and so the 
next words seem to explain it, " in the end of the year, when 
thou hast gathered thy labours out of the field :" in which 
sense it comes nigh our autumn, the latter end of the year. Or, 
perhaps, the phrase rttttfn riNJO betseeth hashanah, may admit 
of a different version, for the verb w> jatsa signifies not only 
exiit, but ortus est, in which sense it is applied to the rising 
of the sun, Gen. xix. 23 ; Psalm xix. 6 ; and to the birth of 
man; Job i. 21 ; 1 Kings viii. 19; Isa. xi. 1. Accordingly 
betseeth hashanah may be as justly rendered in ortu anni, 
as in exitu anni; in the beginning as in the end of the year, 
and may as properly be applied to the first month as the last. 
But it is not so obvious, for what reason the feast of taber- 
nacles was fixed to this season. One might naturally expect, 
that the annual commemoration of their dwelling in tents in 
the wilderness should be celebrated at the same time of the 

* See a larger account of this ceremony in Lightfoot's Temple Service, 
ehap. xvi. sect. iv. 



CHAP. VI.] THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 



497 



year, when either they first betook themselves to tents on their 
leaving Egypt presently after the passover, or when they 
rjuitted their tents upon their entrance into Canaan, a little 
before the passover, which was kept in the plains of Jericho ; 
Joshua v. 10: whereas this feast was appointed to be cele- 
brated at near six months' distance from either. 

Rabbi Jacob Levita conceives, that, as it was usual with 
people in warm climates to live much in tents or booths in 
summer, for coolness, God purposely directed the celebration 
of this feast to be delayed to that season of the year when the 
cold mornings, winds, and rains, ordinarily obliged them to 
quit their booths and betake themselves to their houses; that 
it might appear, their dwelling in booths at this time was not 
for convenience or pleasure, but in obedience to the Divine 
command.* Maimonides, on the contrary, observes, that this 
feast was wisely fixed to that season, when the people might 
dwell in booths with the least inconvenience, because the 
weather was then moderate, and they were not wont to be 
troubled either with heat or with rain.f 

Others have therefore endeavoured to prove, that this was 
the time of the year when Moses came down the second time 
from the mount, and brought them the joyful news, that God 
was appeased for the sin of the golden calf ; and that he had 
accordingly ordered the tabernacle to be reared, in token that 
now he no longer disdained to dwell among them, in memory 
of which this feast is supposed to be appointed. However, 
this is assigning a quite different reason for their dwelling in 
booths or tabernacles from that which the Scripture assigns ; 
for according to the Scripture this appointment was designed, 
not in commemoration of God's dwelling in the tabernacle 
among them, but of their '* dwelling in tents forty years in the 
wilderness." 

The learned Joseph Mede's opinion seems to be the most 
probable, as well as the most ingenious, J namely, that this feast 
was affixed to the time of the year when Christ was to be 
born, and the dwelling in tabernacles was intended as a type of 

* Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis Hebrseor. part ii. cap. xvi. sect, iv, 
p. 318, 319. 

f Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. lib. iii. cap. xiiii. 
X Mede's Diatrib. disc, xlviii. p. 268 of his Works, edit. 1677. 

2 K 



498 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [bOOKHI. 

his incarnation; as St. John seems to intimate, when he saith, 
" the word was made flesh, kql egkyivumtev ev ri/xiv, and taber- 
nacled in or with us;" John i. 14. 

We are assured by the apostles, that the law in the general 
had "a shadow of good things to come," Heb. x. 1, or a 
typical reference to Christ and the gospel dispensation. It 
is, therefore, incredible, that any of the three grand festivals 
should be without some illustrious type of him, or should not 
point to some principal circumstance concerning him ; as we 
know the passover and the pentecost did, the former being a 
type of his passion, the latter of his sending the first-fruits of 
his Spirit, on his setting up the gospel kingdom. And can it 
be imagined, that the third principal feast, which was more 
solemn than either of the others, having a more extraordinary 
course of sacrifices annexed to it, should not typically point to 
some grand event concerning him and his kingdom ? And to 
what can we so naturally apply it, especially after the hints 
St. John has given us in the passage before quoted, as to the 
incarnation and birth of our Saviour? The events, then, that 
Were typified by the two former feasts, falling out at the very 
time of those festivals, it is probable the case was the same as 
to the feast of tabernacles, and that Christ was born at this 
festival . # 

Of the Time of Christ's Nativity. s 

As to the vulgar opinion, that the birth of Christ was on 
the twenty -fifth of December, there is not only no good rea- 
son for it, but the contrary. 

It is certain, this day was not fixed upon in the Christian 
church, as the day of our Saviour's nativity, till after the'time 
of Constantine, in the fourth century; and then it was upon 
a mistaken supposition, that Zacharias, the father of John the 
Baptist, was the high-priest, and that the day when he burnt 
incense upon the altar in the temple, while the people were 

* On the feast of tabernacles, besides the Mishna,tit. Succah, and Dachs, 
Talmudis Babylon, codex Succah, sive de Tabernaculorum Festo passim, 
see Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis Diebus Hebraeor. part ii. cap. xvi. ; 
Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. v. ; Ainsworth on Levit. xxiii. 34 — 43 ; Light- 
foot's Temple Service, chap, xvi.; Leidekker. de Republ. Hebr. lib. ix. 
cap. vii. 



CHAP. VI.] THE TIME OF CHRIST'S BIRTH. 499 

waiting without, was the clay of expiation, or the tenth of the 
month Tisri, which fell out that year about the middle of Sep- 
tember. As soon as Zacharias had fulfilled the days of his 
ministration, John the Baptist was conceived, that is, toward 
the end of September. Our Saviour was conceived six 
months after, that is, toward the end of March, and con- 
sequently his birth must fall out toward the end of Decem- 
ber. This is the ground upon which the feast of our Saviour's 
nativity was fixed to the twenty-fifth of December. # How- 
ever, that it is erroneous is very evident; for Zacharias was 
not in the holy of holies, into which the high-priest only en- 
tered, when the angel appeared to him ; but by the altar of 
incense, which stood in the sanctuary without the veil, Luke i. 
1 1 ; at which altar the common priests performed their daily 
ministry. Neither was Zacharias the high-priest; for we are 
told, that " he was of the course of Abia," and that his lot 
" was to burn incense," ver. 5.9; whereas the high-priest was 
of no course at all, neither did burning incense in the most 
holy place fall to him by lot, but was part of his proper and 
peculiar office. Accordingly there is no reason to conclude, 
that the day when the angel appeared to Zacharias was the 
day of expiation, which is the foundation of the common 
opinion concerning the time of the birth of Christ. 

I add farther, that not only is the vulgar opinion of the 
season of his nativity destitute of any just ground; but there 
are good and valid arguments against it. For instance, 

There was a decree from Caesar Augustus issued and exe- 
cuted at this season, that all persons, women as well as men, 
should repair to their respective cities, to be taxed, or en- 
rolled. This occasioned the Virgin Mary to come to Beth- 
lehem at that time; where she was delivered. But surely 
this decree was not executed in the middle of winter, which 
was a very severe season in that country, and highly incon- 
venient for travelling, especially for such multitudes, and in 
particular for women in Maiy's condition; as may be inferred 
from what our Saviour saith in the twenty-fourth chapter of. 
St. Matthew, concerning the difficulties to which his disciples 
would be exposed, if their flight, previous to the siege and 

* Spanheim. Histor. Eccles. secul. i. sect, ii.; de Nativitate, sect, iii. p, 
523, 524; et secul. iv. sect. vi. de Ritibus, p. 855, edit. Lugd. Bat. 1701. 

2 k 2 



.000 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



destruction of Jerusalem, should happen in the winter, 
ver. 20. 

Again, at the time when Christ was born, there were 
shepherds abroad in the fields by night watching their flocks ; 
certainly a very unseasonable service for the winter in Judea, 
if we may judge of the weather in that country, and at that 
season, by the Psalmist's description: " He giveth snow like 
wool, he scattereth the hoar frost like ashes ; he casteth forth 
his ice like morsels; who can stand before his cold?" Psalm 
cxlvii. 16, 17. 

Upon the whole, there is great probability, that Christ was 
not born in December. But, though we do not pretend to 
be certain of the real time when he was born, there are, how- 
ever, several reasons to incline us to believe, it was at the 
feast of tabernacles; particularly, as was hinted before, the 
synchronism of the type and the antitype in the two other 
principal feasts; and the same, therefore, was probably the 
case as to this feast. 

Again, Dr. Lightfoot has offered several arguments, to 
prove that Christ was baptized at the time of the feast of 
tabernacles. # But when he was baptized, he was wcrct crwv 
TpiaKovra apyofizvoQ, that is, entering on his thirtieth year, 
Luke iii. 23 ; consequently this was the same time of the year 
in which he was born. 

Farther, Joseph Scaliger observes, that the twenty-four 
courses of the priests, which went through the year, began 
with the month Nisan about the vernal equinox; and that 
consequently the eighth course, to which Zacharias belonged, 
ministered in the latter part of July. If from thence you 
reckon the five months to the virgin's conception, and nine 
more for her gestation, the birth of Christ will fall in the 
latter end of September, that is, at the season of the feast of 
tabernacles .+ 

* See his Harmony on Luke iii. 21. 

f See Scalig. Fragment, p. 58, 59, ad Calcem Emend. Temp. ; Mede's 
Diatrib. disc, xlviii. on Deut. xvi. 16; Christ's Birth mistimed, a Tract, 
No. iv. in the Phoenix, 1707 ; and in defence of the common opinion, Selden 
on the Birth-day of our Saviour, apud Opera, vol. iii. torn. vi. p. 1405,. et 
seq. 



CHAPTER VII. 



OF THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS AND NEW MOONS. 

Having considered the three grand festivals, at which all 
the male Israelites, who were able, were obliged to assemble 
at the national altar, we proceed to consider the lesser feasts, 
of which some were menstrual, others annual. The men- 
strual were the new moons, which were kept on the first day 
of every month; and of these one was more remarkable and 
to be observed with greater solemnity than the rest ; namely, 
on the first day of the month Tisri. This is styled the " feast 
of trumpets/' 

It is proper first to consider the common new moon feast, 
of which we find no other institution in the law of Moses 
than merely a prescription of certain sacrifices to be offered 
on the day of the new moon, or, which is the same, on the 
first day of the month, over and above the sacrifices that were 
daily offered ; see Numb, xxviii. 11 — 15. 

The sacrifices prescribed on this occasion, are two young 
bullocks, one ram, and seven lambs, for a bumt-offering, and 
a kid of the goats for a sin-offering, to be attended with meat 
offerings and drink-offerings, as usual in other sacrifices. 

The number of the animal sacrifices are eleven, for which 
the Hebrew doctors have devised the following reason, be- 
cause the lunar year falls short of the solar by eleven days. # 
We find only one precept more in the law of Moses concern- 
ing these new T moons; namely, that " in their solemn days, 
and in the beginning of their months, they shall blow with the 
trumpets over their burnt-offerings, and over the sacrifices of 
their peace-offerings;" Numb. x. 10. But this is rather to be 
considered as a ceremony attending the sacrifices, than as 
peculiar to the new moon days; for the same thing is en- 
joined at their other solemn sacrifices, or on their other solemn 

* Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. vii. sect. iv. p. 510, 3d edit. 



502 



J li WISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book Hi. 



days, at the several feasts which are instituted in the twenty- 
third chapter of Leviticus, which were to be proclaimed as 
holy convocations, ver. 2; and this was always done by sound 
of trumpets; Numb. x. 7, 8. 

Indeed, in the eighty-first Psalm this seems to be mentioned 
as a rite peculiar to the new moon : " Blow up the trumpet 
in the new moon, at the time appointed, on the solemn feast 
day;" ver. 3. But it is probable the new moon, here men- 
tioned, was the feast of trumpets, or the new moon at the be- 
ginning of the month Tisri ; for the use of which festival Dr. 
Patrick supposes this Psalm was composed. This was the 
chief new moon of the year, and was distinguished from the 
rest by peculiar rites, particularly by the blowing of trumpets, 
as we shall see hereafter. 

The trumpet, or musical instrument, of which Asaph here 
speaks as to be sounded on the new moon to which he refers, 
was the 12W shophar, made of horn, and therefore sometimes 
rendered the cornet; whereas the instrument used on the or- 
dinary new moons, or at the beginning of their months, was 
the mjftfll chatsotserah, Numb. x. 10, which was made of 
silver; ver. 2. Of both these instruments we have formerly 
given an account.* 

The new moon to which Asaph refers was to be kept as a 
sabbath, for it is called a solemn feast day. But I do not find 
the ordinary new moons ever so styled; nor does it appear by 
the law of Moses, that they were to be observed as sacred 
festivals, or sabbath days, in which no servile work was to be 
done. They are not mentioned among the sacred feasts in 
the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus. Nor is any thing pre- 
scribed on those days more than the offering of the sacrifices 
already mentioned : nevertheless, sacrifices relating to and 
implying devotion in the offerers, those days were accounted 
more sacred than common ones, and were accordingly ob- 
served by pious Israelites for the exercises of devotion ; they 
used at these seasons to repair to the prophets, or other 
ministers of God, to hear his word. This occasioned the 
Shunamite's husband inquiring, for what end she desired to 
go to the prophet that day, " when it was neither new moon 
nor sabbath;" a plain intimation, that it had been her custom 
* See p. 188. 



CHAP. Vll.j THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS. 



503 



to do it on those days. The new moons and sabbaths are men- 
tioned together, as days of public worship, by several of the 
prophets. " It shall come to pass," saith the prophet Isaiah, 
u that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath 
to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the 
Lord f chap. lxvi. 23. Again, " Thus saith the Lord God" (by 
the prophet Ezekiel), " The gate of the inner court, that looketh 
toward the east, shall be shut the six working days ; but on 
the sabbath it shall be opened, and on the day of the new- 
moon it shall be opened;" chap. xlvi. 1. And in the follow- 
ing remarkable passage of the prophet Amos : " Hear this, O 
ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the 
land to fail, saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we 
may sell corn, and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat?" 
&c.,chap. viii. 4, 5. It appears from this passage, that though 
the law did not expressly require that they should abstain 
from servile work on the new moon, as it did on the sabbath, 
worldly business, notwithstanding, was, in a good measure, 
laid aside on those days. 

Besides the public, national sacrifices that were to be offered 
on the new moons, it was customary to make feasts, probably 
on the more private sacrifices offered by particular persons 
and families; see 1 Sam. xx. 5, 6. 

In the opinion of the rabbies, whilst men are allowed to 
follow their vocations on the new moons, as on other days, 
the women were exempted from all labour. For they pre- 
tend, the new moon is in a peculiar manner the festival of the 
women, in commemoration of their liberality at the time of 
erecting the tabernacle, in contributing their most valuable 
jewels to promote the magnificence of the divine service, 
which memorable action was performed, they say, on the new 
moon of the month Nisan. # 

It does not appear in Scripture by what method the ancient 
Jews fixed the time of the new moon, and whether they kept 
this feast on the day of the conjunction, or on the first day of 
the moon's appearing. The rabbies are of the latter opinion. 
They tell us, that, for want of astronomical tables, the Sanhe- 
drim, about the time of the new moon, sent out men to watch 

* See Buxtorfs Synag. Judaic, cap. xxii. p. 473, 474, 3d edit.; et Lei- 
dekker. de Republ. Hebraeor. lib. ix. cap. ii. p. 538, 539, Amstel. 1704. 



504 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



upon the tops of mountains, and give immediate notice to 
them of its first appearance ; upon which a fire was made on 
the top of Mount Olivet, which, being seen at a distance, 
was answered by fires on the tops of other mountains, and 
they in like manner by others still more remote ; by which 
means the notice was quickly spread through the whole land . 
But experience at length taught them, that this kind of intel- 
ligence was not to be depended on, the Samaritans, and 
other profane persons, sometimes kindling such fires on the 
tops of mountains at a wrong season, on purpose to deceive 
the people, and disturb the order of the sacred festivals. In 
later times, therefore, the Sanhedrim was forced to send ex- 
presses on this occasion to all parts of the country. 

It is farther added, that because of the uncertainty that 
would attend this way of fixing the time of the new moon, 
especially in cloudy weather, they observed two days, that 
they might be secure *of being in the right. # Hence they 
account for Saul's expecting David at his table two days 
successively, on the feast of the new moon; 1 Sam. xx. 24. 

The modern Jews keep this festival by repeating certain 
prayers in their synagogues, and afterward by feasting in 
their ow n houses :f and some devotees fast on the vigil of it. J 

Many of them add another ceremony about three days after. 
They meet in companies in the night in some open place, 
when they bless God, in a prayer of considerable length, for 
having created the moon, and for having renewed her, to 
teach the Israelites that they ought to become new creatures. 
Then they leap up thrice in the air as high as they are able, 
and say to the moon, " As we leap up toward thee without 
being able to touch thee, so may it be impossible for our 
enemies to rise up against us to hurt us."§ 

The reason of God's appointing peculiar sacrifices to be 
offered at the new moon might be, in part, to make the time 
of it more carefully observed; which was a matter of consi- 
derable importance, not only to prevent confusion in their 

* See above, chap. i. p. 416. 

f Buxtorf. Synag. cap. xxiv. p. 500. 504. 

I Buxtorf. cap. xxiii. p. 489. 

§ See Basnage's History of the Jews, hook v. chap. xiv. sect. ix. p. 451, 

452. 



CHAP. V 11. J 



THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS. 



505 



chronology, since they reckoned by lunar months, but likewise 
because the true time of observing all their great festivals de- 
pended upon it. Nevertheless, I conceive the chief reason of 
this institution was to preserve the Israelites from the idolatry 
of the heathens, who used to offer sacrifices to the new moon. 
Thus, among the Athenians, the first day of the month was 
t\\ Upwrarrj -n/mepwv, a most holy day, as Plutarch styles it.* 
And there was a law, raig vovfir}VLaig 3"uev, to offer sacrifices on 
the new moons .f Some indeed have observed so great a 
resemblance in several articles of the Athenian law to that of 
Moses, as to suspect, that the Athenian lawgiver took the 
hint of many of them from the Jewish institutions. Be that 
as it will, nothing is more likely than that as the sun and the 
moon were the principal idols the heathens worshipped, it was 
usual for them to pay their devotions to the moon, probably 
by sacrifices, chiefly at the time of her first appearing after 
the change. In order, therefore, to check this species of 
idolatry, God commanded the Israelites to offer solemn sacri- 
fices to him at the same time that the heathens were sacrificing 
to the moon. Accordingly it is very observable, that the sin- 
offering on this occasion, which was to be a kid of the goats, 
is particularly and expressly directed to be offered to Jehovah ; 
Numb, xxviii. 15. The design of this, Grotius observes, was 
to put them in mind of the right object of worship at a time 
when they were in peculiar danger of being seduced to offer 
sacrifices to the moon, after the manner of the heathens : 
which remark is the more worthy of notice, in that, though in 
the same chapter a goat is ordered to be sacrificed for a sin- 
offering, both at the feast of the passover and at pentecost 
(ver. 22 — 30), yet it is not said in either instance, that it 
must be offered to Jehovah, though it was, no doubt, so in- 
tended ; in all probability because there was no such danger 
of this kind of idolatry at those seasons as there was at the 
new moon. Maimonides likewise hath observed, that "this 
sin-offering is so peculiarly said to be unto the Lord, lest any 
should think this goat to be a sacrifice to the moon, after the 
manner of the Egyptians, who used to sacrifice one to the 

* Plutarch, de Vitando sere alieno, Oper. torn. ii. p. 828, A. edit. Fran- 
cof. 1620. 

t Vid. Petiti Comment, in Leges Atticas, lib. i. tit. i. p. 85. 



506 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



moon at this time, as they did to the sun at his rising."* And 
it seems, among the heathens, the goat was a favourite sacri- 
fice to the moon, because the horns of that animal somewhat 
resemble the new moon.f Thus much for the common new 
moon. 

The new moon which began the month Tisri, the seventh of 
the ecclesiastical, but the first of the civil year, was to be ob- 
served with more than ordinary solemnity, not only with seve- 
ral sacrifices additional to those that were offered on other 
new moons, but it was to be kept as a sabbath, in which they 
were to have a holy convocation, and to do no servile work. 
And besides the sounding the trumpets over the sacrifices, as 
on the other new moons and solemn festivals, this was to be 
" a day of blowing the trumpets," Numb. xxix. 1 ; that is, as 
the ancient Jews understand it, they were to be blown from 
morning to evening ; t at least it imports they were to be blown 
more on this day than on any other. 

This day is also called a memorial of blowing of trum- 
pets Lev. xxiii. 24. § 

The Scripture nowhere expressly assigning the reason of 
this festival, and particularly of the blowing of trumpets, from 
whence it is called the feast of trumpets, the learned are very 
much divided about it. Maimonides thinks it was instituted 
to awaken the people to repentance against the annual fast, or 
great day of expiation, which followed nine days after. He 
makes the sound of the trumpet on this day to be in effect 
saying, " Shake off your drowsiness, ye that sleep, search and 
try your ways, remember your Creator and repent, bethink 
yourselves and take care of your souls," &c.|| 

Some have supposed, that the apostle refers to this use and 
meaning of blowing the trumpets in the following passage of 
the Epistle to the Ephesians: "Wherefore he saith, Awake, 

* Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xlvi. prsesertim, p. 488. 

t Spencer, de Legibus Hebraeor. lib. iii. dissert, iv. cap. i. sect. v. p. 814, 
torn. ii. edit. Cantab. 1727. 

X Minister, in loc. ; et Buxtorf. Synag. cap. xxiv. p. 504. 

§ See the institution of this festival, Numb. xxix. 1 — 6 ; Lev. xxiii. 24, 25. 

|| Maimon. de Poenitentia, cap. iii. sect. vi. p. 56, edit, et vers. Clavering. 
Oxon. 1705. See also Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xliii. p. 471, 472, 
edit. Buxtorf. 1629; and Shorn Tobh on Maimonides, quoted by Hottinger 
on Godwin, lib. iii. cap. vii, sect. vi. not. iv. p. 601. 



CHAP. VII.] 



THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS. 



507 



thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall 
give thee light;" chap. v. 14. Accordingly they make the 
nominative case to \eyei, he saith, to be Gaoc, God, as speak- 
ing by the voice or sound of the trumpet. To this it may be 
objected, not only that there is no intimation in Scripture, that 
the trumpets were blown for the purposes Maimonides ima- 
gines, but likewise that the apostle would hardly have referred 
to a Jewish ceremony, as if the meaning of it were well 
known, when he was writing to the Gentiles, who probably 
were unacquainted with the ceremony itself, and much more 
with its design and intention. Others, therefore, suppose the 
nominative case to \eyei is ypa^rj, the Scripture, or God speak- 
ing in the Scripture, and that there is a reference to the fol- 
lowing passage of Isaiah: "Arise, shine, for thy light is come, 
and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee," chap. lx. 1 ; 
quoted by the apostle, though not verbatim, yet according to 
the sense ; while others apprehend the allusion is not so much 
to any particular passage as to the general and principal design 
of the sacred oracles, which evidently is to awaken, convert, 
and save sinners. 

It is an jngenious conjecture of Heumannus,* that this 
passage is taken out of one of those hymns, or spiritual songs, 
which were in common use in the Christian church in those 
times, and which are mentioned by the apostle in a subsequent 
passage, " Speaking to yourselves in psalms, and hymns, and 
spiritual songs;" Eph. v. 19. This author observes, that it 
consists of three metrical lines, 

Eyttpat 6 icaOtvdiov, 

Kai avaara tK rwv vfjcpwr, 

Kai tm^avffei aot 6 Xpiorojj. 

As for ho \tyti, he makes it to be the same with Sto Aeytrat, 
" wherefore it is said," as in Rom. xv. 10. But, on supposi- 
tion that these lines were taken out of some hymns or spiri- 
tual songs, known to have been composed by inspiration, I 
should rather think the nominative case to Xtyu may be Osog, 
or nvzvfia ayiov. To return to the subject we are upon :— 

It may be farther objected to Maimonides and some other 
Jews, who conceive the design of blowing the trumpets was 

* Poeclles, torn. ii. lib. ii. p. 390, as cited by Wolfius, Curas Philologicae 
in loc. 



508 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



to awaken men to repentance, that nynn jro? zickron terutig- 
nah, which we render, "a memorial of blowing the trumpets," 
Levit. xxiii. 24, properly signifies a memorial of triumph, or 
shouting for joy; for, as Dr. Patrick observes,* the word 
nynn terungnah is never used in Scripture but for a sound or 
shout of rejoicing, as the Chaldee jabbaba, by which 

Onkelos renders it, always signifies.f 

Other Jews, therefore, make the blowing of the trumpet to 
be a memorial of Isaac's deliverance by means of the ram, 
which was substituted to be sacrificed in his stead. Accord- 
ingly they say, the trumpets blown on this day must be made 
of rams' horns ; and such are those which the modern Jews 
blow in their synagogues.! 

They sound the horn thirty times, sometimes slow and 
sometimes quick. If the trumpeter sounds it clear and well, 
they reckon it a presage of a happy year ; if otherwise, they 
express their concern by the sadness of their countenances, 
esteeming it an unfavourable omen. When he hath done, the 
people repeat these words loudly and distinctly, § " Blessed is 
the people that know the joyful sound ; they shall walk, O 
Lord, in the light of thy countenance ;" Psalm lxxxix. 15. And 
when they return from the synagogue, their salutation to one 
another is, " Mayest thou be written in a good year;" the 
reply, " And thou also."|| 

Some of the Christian fathers, particularly Basils and 
Theodoret,** make the sounding of the trumpets on this day 
to be a memorial of the giving of the law at mount Sinai, 
which was attended with the sound of a trumpet ; Exod. xix. 
16. But the opinion more generally embraced, both by Jews 
and Christians, is, that it was a memorial of the creation of 
the world, at which the "sons of God shouted for joy," Job 
xxxviii. 7 ; and which is supposed, not altogether without 
reason, to have been at this season of the year. The month 
Tisri, therefore, was not only anciently, but is still, reckoned 

* Patrick on Numb. xxix. 1. 

f See Chaldee Paraphrase on Numb. xxix. 1. 

\ Abarbanel in Levit. xxiii. 24. 

§ Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xxiv. p. 502. 

S| Buxtorf, p. 497, 498. 5l Basil in Psalm Ixxxi. 

Theodoret. Questiones in Levit. quaest. xxxii. 



CH A P. VI T.] 



THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS. 



509 



by the Jews the first month of the year ; and the feast of ta- 
bernacles, which was kept in this month, was said to be 
njitfn DDtpn tekuphath hashanah, Exod. xxxiv. 22, which we 
render " at the end," but in the margin more truly, " at the 
revolution of the year ;" importing, that at this season the 
year had revolved, and was beginning anew. So that the 
feast of trumpets was indeed the new year's day, on which the 
people were solemnly called to rejoice in a grateful remem- 
brance of all God's benefits to them through the last year, 
which might be intended by blowing the trumpets ; as well as 
to implore his blessing upon them for the ensuing year, which 
was partly the intention of the sacrifices on this day offered. 

The modern Jews have a notion, which they derive from 
the Mishna, # that on this day God judges all men, wko pass 
before him as a flock before the shepherd. Therefore, as 
Basnage saith, their zealots spend some a whole month 
beforehand, others four days, and especially the eve of this 
feast, in confessing their sins, beating their breasts, and some 
in lashing their bare backs by way of penance, in order to 
procure a favourable judgment on this decisive day. He adds, 
if Christians should be told that they have derived their vigils, 
their whipcord discipline, and the merit annexed to them, 
from the Jews, though they would not be pleased, it is never- 
theless probable. "t 

As for the long account which Godwin gives us of the 
translation of feasts, it is mere rabbinical trifling, without the 
least foundation in the sacred oracles, and, of consequence, 
utterly unworthy our attention. J 

* Mishn. tit. Rosh Hashanah, cap. i. sect. ii. torn. i. p. 311. 

f See Basnage's History of the Jews, book v. chap. xiii. On the feast 
of trumpets, see Meyer, de Tempor. et Festis Diebus Hebraeor. 

X Vid. Bochart. Hieroz. part i. lib. ii. cap. i. Oper. torn. ii. p. 561, 562, 
Lugd. Bat. 1712. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



OF THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 

Godwin styles this day the feast of expiation, whereas it 
Was altogether a fast, a day of deep humiliation, and of 
" afflicting their souls. ,,# Nevertheless he is so inconsistent 
with himself, that he understands the fast mentioned in the 
account of St Paul's voyage to Rome, Acts xxvii. 9, to be 
meant of the day of expiation. It is true there is no express 
injunction in the law of Moses, nor anywhere in the Old Tes- 
tament, to fast on this solemnity. But that it was understood 
to be a fast by the Jews appears from Josephusf and Philo, J 
who both style this day v^arua, " the fast." The rabbies com- 
monly distinguish it by the name of n31 ND2f tsoma rabba, 
the great fast.§ Tertullian likewise, speaking of the two 
goats that were offered on this day, sa.iih,jejunio offerebantur 
they were offered on the fast.|| 

As for the fast mentioned in the account of St. Paul's 
voyage, and concerning which it is said, that " sailing was 
now dangerous, because the fast was now past," Acts xxvii. 
9; Castalio, not being able to conceive what a Jewish fast 
could have to do with sailing, supposes there is an error in the 
Greek copy, and that instead of vrjoraav it should be vrjvt/umv, 
which signifies calm weather ; and according to him the mean- 
ing is, that sailing was now dangerous, because the fine wea- 
ther, or calm season, was now over. However, all the ma- 
nuscripts and ancient versions remonstrate against this emen- 
dation; and, indeed, there is no need of it, to support even 

* See an account of the institution of this annual solemnity, Lev. xvi., 
and chap, xxiii. 27 — 32. 

f Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. x. sect. iii. p. 172. 

X Philo de Vita Mosis, lib. ii. Oper. p. 508, F, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. 
§ Midrasch Ruth. xlvi. 4, et Echa Rabbati, lxxx. 1, quoted by Reland, 
Antiq. part iv. cap. vi. sect. i. p. 492. 

jj Tertullian adversus Judeeos, cap. xiv. Oper. p. 201, C, edit. Rigalt 



CHAP. VIII.] THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 511 

Castalio's own sense of the passage ; for this Jewish fast being 
kept on the tenth day of the month Tisri, a little after the 
autumnal equinox, it is in fact the same thing to say the fast 
was already past, or the calm season of the year was over. 

Before the invention and use of the compass, sailing was 
rarely practised in the winter months; and it was reckoned 
very dangerous to put to sea after the autumnal equinox. 
Hesiod observes, that at the going down of the Pleiades 
navigation is dangerous j* and the going down of the 
Pleiades, he saith, was in autumn, when after harvest they 
begin to plough .f Again, speaking of safe and prosperous 
sailing, for which he allots fifty days after the summer sol- 
stice, he admonishes to make haste, and get home before the 
time of new wine, and the autumnal storms, which make the 
sea difficult and dangerous. J Philostratus, in his Life of 
Apollonius Tyaneus,^ saith, that at the latter end of autumn 
the sea was more unsettled. And Philo speaks of the begin- 
ning of autumn as the last season that was fit for navigation. || 
These testimonies sufficiently demonstrate, that when the 
sacred historian declares, that " sailing was now dangerous, 
because the fast was already past," he speaks according to the 
common sense and apprehension of those times ; and he like- 
wise ascertains the season of the year, when this fast was 
kept, to be about or soon after the autumnal equinox; which, 
answering to the time of the day of expiation among the 
Jews, renders it highly probable, that this was the particular 
fast to which the writer of the Acts refers. As to the objec- 
tion of Erasmus Schmidius,^f that it is improbable these 
Alexandrian mariners should denominate the seasons of the 
year from Jewish fasts or festivals, he should have observed, 
that the passage under consideration is not the words of the 
Alexandrian mariners, but of Luke the historian, who was 
a Jew by nation, and no doubt, therefore, denominated the 
seasons from some Jewish fast, according to the custom of his 
country. 

* Hesiod, Opera et Dies, lib. ii. I. 236 — 240. 

f Hesiod, lib. ii. 1. 2. j Hesiod, lib. ii. 1. 231—295. 

§ Philostrat. in Vita Apollonii, lib. iv. cap. iv. p. 168, A, edit. Paris, 1608. 

|| Philo, Legat. ad Caium, Oper. p. 770, B, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. 

% Erasmus Schmidius in loc. 



512 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



Scaliger* conceives the fast here referred to was that in 
the month Tebeth, or the tenth month, answering to our 
December or January ; which fast is mentioned by the prophet 
Zechariah, chap. viii. 19, and was kept in memory of Nebu- 
chadnezzar's sitting down before Jerusalem, to besiege it, on 
the tenth day of the month; 2 Kings xxv. 1. Scaliger has 
been followed in this opinion by several others : but is con- 
futed by Has3eus,t who shows, that sailing was absolutely 
disused, both by the Romans and Greeks, in the depth of 
winter. The Romans shut up the sea, or forbad sailing, from 
the third of the ides of November to the sixth of the ides of 
March ; that is, from November the twenty-second to March 
the twenty first ; and it appears by Theophrastus,J that the 
Greeks opened the sea at their Dionysia, or feast of Bacchus, 
which was kept in March. It is, therefore, altogether im- 
probable, or rather incredible, that the ship in which Paul 
sailed should put to sea soon after the fast of the tenth month. 
It remains, then, that the fast here intended must be the day 
of expiation, which fell out in our September or October. 

This account from Hasasus will likewise explain the reason 
of Paul and his companions stopping three months at Melita, 
before they could get a passage to Italy. " After three 
months we departed in a ship of Alexandria, which had win- 
tered in the isle ;" Acts xxviii. 11. Now, supposing they first 
put to sea at the beginning or middle of October, yet sailing 
slowly, and much time being spent before their shipwreck, 
chap, xxvii. 7. 9, probably they did not arrive at Melita till 
the middle of December ; and there they were forced to stay 
till the sea was opened in the spring, or till the law allowed 
them to put to sea again in March. 

Upon the whole, as there is great reason to conclude that 
the fast, which was lately past at the beginning of Paul's 
voyage, was the day of expiation ; we may from hence infer, 
that this day was kept as a fast by the Jews ; though, as we 
before observed, fasting is not expressly enjoined in the Mo- 

* De Emendat. Tempor. cited by Wolfius, Curse Philologicae in Act. 
xxvii. 9. 

f See his Discourse de Computatione Mensium Paulini Itineris, in the 
Bibliotheca Bremensis, class, i. p. 17, et seq. 
| Theophrast. Charact. Ethic, cap. iv. alias iii. 



CHAP. VIII.] THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 513 

saic institution, unless it was included, or, as some have 
thought, directly intended in the words " Ye shall afflict your 
souls;" Lev. xvi. 29. This seems to be the meaning of the 
same expression in the following passage of Isaiah : " Is it 
such a fast that I have chosen ? a day for a man to afflict his 
soul? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread 
sackcloth and ashes under him? Wilt thou call this a fast, 
and an acceptable day to the Lord?" chap, lviii. 5. Among 
the several external rites here particularly specified, as belong- 
ing to a fast, and as carefully observed by the hypocritical 
Jews, there is nothing said of their abstinence from food, 
which undoubtedly belonged to a fast, and might naturally 
have been expected to have been mentioned on this occasion, 
unless it be intended by the phrase, u afflicting their souls." 
By the soul we may understand the sensitive part of man, 
which is afflicted by fasting. Accordingly David saith, that 
he had " humbled his soul with fasting;" Ps. xxxv. 13. The 
word here translated humbled is the same which in Leviticus 
is rendered afflicted. And if by the soul we understand the 
rational soul, or mind, some have observed a natural connex- 
ion between afflicting the soul with a deep, penitential sense 
of sin, and bodily fasting; inasmuch as great grief never fails 
to pall the appetite, and incline men to fast; and therefore 
" afflicting their souls" very naturally implies abstinence from 
food. Hence, perhaps, the light of nature hath led men to 
practise fasting, as a proper token and evidence of inward 
contrition. Thus the Ninevites, though heathens, proclaimed 
a fast of strict abstinence from food, when they were threat- 
ened with speedy destruction; Jonah iii. 5. 7. We find, in- 
deed, no Scripture example of religious fasting before the 
institution of this annual fast by Moses ; yet this silence con- 
cerning it will by no means prove it was never practised. But 
from the time of Moses the Jewish history abounds with in- 
stances and examples of this sort. After the unexpected de- 
feat before Ai, Joshua and all the elders of Israel continued 
prostrate before the ark from morning to night, Josh, vii. 6; 
which must therefore be without eating. The same was prac- 
tised by the eleven tribes, upon the, desolation which had be- 
fallen the tribe of Benjamin ; they " wept, and sat there before 
the Lord, and fasted that day until evening;" Judges xx. 26 ; 

2 L, 



514 



JEWISH AN T I Q U IT I E S . 



[BOOK 111 



and again by all the people at Mizpeh, in token of their 
repentance for having served Baalim and other strange gods, 
1 Sam. vii. 6; and particularly by David, in hopes of saving 
the life of the child which he had by Bathsheba, 2 Sam. xii. 
16; and on other occasions, when, as he saith in the before- 
cited passage, he " humbled his soul with fasting." 

Besides the annual fast in the seventh month, we read of 
three others kept by the Jews after their return from the cap- 
tivity; one in the fourth month, another in the fifth, another 
in the tenth ; Zech. viii. 19. The later Jews had so multiplied 
them, that they filled almost half their calendar. 

According to the rabbies, the fast we are now speaking of 
was to be observed with extraordinary strictness: they men- 
tion six things in particular, which thev were that day to 
abstain from; namely, eating, drinking, washing, anointing 
themselves, wearing shoes, at least those made of leather, and 
the use of the marriage-bed.* 

This fast being called a sabbath, and being kept like a sab- 
bath, by their abstaining from all servile work (Lev. xvi. 31), 
as probably their other fasts were, might occasion the error of 
those heathen writers, who represent the Jews as fasting on 
their weekly sabbaths. Suetonius cites Octavius saying, in 
an epistle to Tiberius, " Ne Judeeus quidem, mi Tiberi, tarn 
diligenter sabbatis jejunium servat quam ego hodie servavi :" 
a Jew does not observe the fast of his sabbath so carefully as 
I have done to-day .+ And Justin saith of Moses, " Quo 
(sc. ad montem Synae) septem dierum jejunio per deserta 
Arabise cum populo suo fatigatus, cum tandem venisset septi- 
mum diem, more gentis sabbatum appeilatum, in omne awum 
jejunium sacravit, quoniam ilia dies famem illis erroremque 
finierat:" that, arriving at Mount Sinai, after wandering and 
fasting in the deserts of Arabia seven days, he consecrated 
every seventh day, called the sabbath, for a perpetual fast, 
because that day had put a period to their wandering and 
hunger.^ 

* Mishn. tit. Joraa, cap. viii. sect. i. torn. ii. p. 252, Surenhus. 

t Sueton. in Vit. Octav. cap. ixxvi. p. 473, 474, tom.j. edit. Pitisci, 
Traject. ad Rhen. 1690. 

X Justin, lib. xxxvi. cap. ii. sect. xiv. p. 524, edit. Gwexu, Lugd. Bat. 
1701. 



GH A P. VIII,] 



THE DAY OF 



EXPIATION. 



515 



This annual fast is called in the Hebrew D'ODDH D^jom 
hacchipurim, the day of atonement, kut t%,oyy)v, Lev. xxiii. 
27, because of the extraordinary expiatory sacrifices offered 
thereon, and because the rites which the law prescribed to 
be then used, were more eminently typical of the ministry of 
our great high-priest Jesus Christ, and of the atonement made 
by him for the sins of his people, than those which appertained 
to any other festival. And whereas other expiatory sacrifices 
atoned for particular sins, and the sins of particular persons, 
the Jews say, the sacrifices of this day atoned for all the sins 
of the foregoing year, and that of the whole nation. # They 
add likewise, that on this day Satan had no power to do any 
harm to their nation, as he had on the other three hundred 
and sixty-four davs of the year. Which opinion is abundantly 
confirmed by the cabalists ; for they find that the letters of 
the word }D£7T hasatan, make, according to their gematria, 
three hundred sixty and four.f 

Several reasons are assigned by the Jews for God's fixing 
this annual fast and expiation to the tenth day of the month 
Tisri. For instance, their tradition saith, this was the day on 
which Adam repented of his transgression, and God was re- 
conciled to him; and the day also on which Abraham was 
circumcised; and therefore they were in so particular a man- 
ner to repent of and atone for their transgressions of God's 
covenant, on this day, when they (as being included in their 
father Abraham) were first taken into covenant with God. J 

Farther, the rabbies tell us, this was the day on which 
Moses came down the last time from the mount, having re- 
ceived the second table from God, with an assurance of his 
having pardoned their sin of the golden calf, and therefore it 
was annually to be kept as a day of expiation and plenary 
remission. § 

* Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. iii. sect. viii. With respect to offences against 
their neighbours, the expiation was on condition the offended persons were 
appeased. See sect. ix. 

f Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xxvi. p. 535, 3d edit. 

I Abarbanel in Lev. xxiii. cited by Meyer, de Temporibus et Festis He- 
braeor. part ii. cap. xv. sect. iii. p. 309, 310; and more fully by Nicolai, 
Annot. in Cunseum de Republ. Hebrseor. lib. ii. cap. iv. not. i. p. 223, 224, 
Lugd. Bat. 1703. 

§ Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part. iii. cap. xliii. 

2 l 2 



516 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 

It was probably on this last Jewish tradition that Moham- 
med founded the institution of his annual fast on the month 
Ramadan, in which he saith the Koran was sent down from 
heaven. # 

On these Jewish. traditions we can have no dependence: 
nor need we be solicitous to discover the reason of God's ap- 
pointing the tenth of the month Tisri for the day of expiation 
in preference to any other, since the absolute silence of Scrip- 
ture concerning it is a sufficient indication, that the knowledge 
of it is of no importance. 

We have only to observe farther concerning the time of this 
fast, that it was to be kept from evening to evening, Lev. 
xxiii. 32; which expression, as it is peculiar to this day, and 
is not used concerning the weekly sabbath, or any other festi- 
val, the Jews understand to import more than a natural day; 
or that this fast was to comprehend the evening, or some of 
the latter part, of the ninth day, as well as the whole tenth. 
Although, therefore, the tenth day of the month is appointed 
for the day of atonement, ver. 27, yet it is said, ver. 32, 
" Ye shall afflict your souls in the ninth day at evening." 
Accordingly they are said to have begun this half an hour be- 
fore sun-set on the ninth, and to have continued it till half an 
hour after sun-set on the tenth. So that this sabbath was an 
hour longer than any other.f It is therefore called in the 
Talmud joma, the day, by way of eminence, and by the 
Hellenistic Jews, <7u/3j3a~ov <x«/3j3arwv. 

We now proceed to the consideration of those rites with 
which the day of expiation was to be observed. And here 
from the rabbies I might give you a long detail of those which 
were preparatory, and were used for several days beforehand ; 
especially relating to the high-priest, who on this day was to 
perform the most solemn part of all his ministry. They tell 
us, that, leaving his own house, he constantly resided in an 
apartment of the temple for a week before, and during every 
day practised the sacred rites, such as sprinkling the blood of 
the daily sacrifices, burning incense, &c, that he might be 
expert in performing the peculiar duties of his office on the day 

* Sale's Translation of the Koran, chap. ii. p. 21. 

f Maimon. de Solennitate Expiationum, cap. i. sect. vi. p. 823, 824, 
Crenii Fascicul. Septimi. 



CHAP. VIII.] THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 



517 



of expiation. And lest after all he should be ignorant or un- 
mindful of them, the Sanhedrim sent elders to read the cere- 
monial to him, to direct him in the service requisite on this 
occasion, and to swear him not to make any alteration in it.* 
But, as Basnage very justly observes, the Talmudists make no 
scruple to invent ceremonies unknown to their fathers ;f we 
shall therefore pass over the rites mentioned by them without 
any farther notice, and attend only to those that are prescribed 
in the divine law. 

Besides fasting, spoken of before, this day was to be kept 
with all the strict and religious regard of a sabbath, Lev. xxiii. 
32 ; xvi. 29 ; and with offering sacrifices, first for the high- 
priest and his family, and then for the people ; Heb. vii. 27. ± 

The victims offered on this day, including the daily burnt- 
offerings, were fifteen. The two first were a bullock and a 
ram, and were designed to make atonement for the " high- 
priest himself, and for his house ;" by which is probably meant 
the other priests, and perhaps the whole tribe of Levi ; for the 
priests are called ''the house of Aaron;" Psalm cxv. 10. 12; 
and cxxxv. 19. However, Rabbi Jehuda, understanding by 
the high-priest's house chiefly his wife, makes it so necessary 
for him to have a wife on this day, that, if she died, he must 
marry another, that he might satisfy the law, by making ex- 
piation for himself and his wife. But this opinion is rejected 
by the other rabbies.§ 

Of the victims, none are more remarkable than the two 
goats, which the high-priest was to receive from the congre- 
gation, and to set them before the tabernacle, casting lots, 
which of the two should be immediately sacrificed, and which 
should be sent alive into the wilderness, after the sins of the 
people had been confessed over him, and laid as it were upon 
him. The manner in which these lots were cast does not ap- 
pear in Scripture. But if we may credit the rabbies, there 

* Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. i. sect. i. — v. p. 206 — 209, torn. ii. edit. Surenbusii; 
Maimon. de Solenni Die Expiationum, cap, i. sect. iii. — v. p. 653 — 655, 
Crenii Fascic. Septimi. See also Buxtorf. de Synag. cap. xxv. xxvi. 

f Basnage's History of the Jews, book v. chap. xiii. sect. vi. p. 448. 

I See an account of these sacrifices in Lev. xvi. 3. 5. 8, and Numb. xxix. 
7—11. 

§ Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. i. sect. i. cum notis Maimon. et Bartenor. in loc. 
p. 206, torn, ii, edit. Surenhus. 



518 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 

was an urn brought to the high-priest, into which he threw two 
wooden lots, on one of which was written, " For the Lord 
on the other, " For gnazazel," the word which we ren- 
der the scape-goat. After he had shaken them, he put both 
his hands into the urn, and brought up the lots, one in each 
hand ; and as the goats stood one on each side of him, their 
fate was determined by the lot that came up in the hand next 
to them. If the right hand brought up the lot for the Lord, 
they regarded it as a good omen. This, they say, fell out 
through the whole priesthood of Simeon the Just. If the left 
hand brought up that lot, they accounted it as a bad omen, 
and an indication that God was not pacified.* 

The goat, on which the lot fell for life, is called in the 
Hebrew bx&\y gnazazel, Lev. xvi. 8; concerning the meaning 
of which word there are divers opinions. The chief are the 
three following : — 

1st. The most common opinion is, that totyp gnazazel is a 
name given to the goat itself, on account of his being let go; 
as being derived from ?y gnez, a goat, and V?N azel, abiit, to 
go away. Thus it is explained by Buxtorf,+ and by Paulus 
Fagius,J and many others ;§ and so it was understood by our 
translators, who therefore render it a scape-goat; the Sep- 
tuagint likewiseTenders it aTroirofiiraiog, and the Vulgate, emis- 
sarins. To this interpretation it is, however, objected, that 

gnaz, signifying a she-goat, azel, w hich is the third 
person masculine, cannot agree with it. JBochart, therefore, 
derives gnazazel from the Arabic word gnazala, signifying to 
remove or separate ; and understands by it a separate place, 
or wilderness. i| But others perceive no occasion to have re- 
course to the Arabic, as with respect to compound words 
such an en alia ge generis is not uncommon in the Hebrew.^" 

* Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. iii. sect. ix. p. 223, torn. ii. ; et Maimon. de So- 
lemn Die Expiationum, cap. iii. sect. i. — iii. p. 665 — 668, Crenii Fascic. 
Septimi. 

f Buxtorf. Lexic. Hebraic, et Chaldaic. in verb. 
| Fagius in loc. apud Criticos Sacros. 

§ Francisc. Turretine de Veritate Satisfact. Christi, part iii. sect. xxiv. 
p. 141, Geneva;, 1666. 

|| Bochart. Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. liv. p. 653, et seq. 

Vid. Witsii (Econom. Feeder, lib. iv. cap. vi. sect. liii. p. 506, edit. 
Leovard. 1677. Mr. Jones, in his MS. Lectures on Godwin, observes, that 
the word gnez, seems to be of the epicene gender. Non diffitendum est 



CHAP. VIII.] 



THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 



519 



2dly. The second opinion, espoused by Le Clerc,* is, that 
gnazazel' was the name of a place, either a mountain or cliff, to 
which the goat was led, and from thence, as the rabbies say, 
he was cast down and killed. f In favour of this it is alleged, 
that the words in the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus, " He 
that let go the goat," bwtyb langnazazel, cannot be properly 
rendered any other way than to gnazazel, which intimates, 
that gnazazel must be a place. 

To this it is objected, that those who have examined the 
geography of the Holy Land have never been able to point out 
any place of that name, except in an anonymous writer of very 
little credit, mentioned by Aben-Ezra, who speaks of such a 
mountain near Mount Sinai, which must have been too far 
distant for the scape-goat to have been conducted thither from 
Jerusalem. Besides, Moses usually prefixes the word mount 
to the proper name of any mountain, as Mount Hebor, Mount 
Gerizim,J &c. 

3dly. The third opinion is that of Spencer, § who is followed 
byWitsius,|| Coccejus,^f Altingius,** Meyer,ff and others, 
quidem, inquit ille, quin gnez, quam plurimum in Scripturis usurpatur in 
genere fsemineo ; sed non inde sequitur quod ea vox nunquam in masculino 
fuit usurpata ; revera vero potius vox epicena videtur, quae utrique generi 
tribui possit, quum pluralem format more masculinorum ; et quod revera 
ita est ex Gen. xxx. 32, 33, cons-tare videtur ; procul dubio enim hircos 
aeque ac capras habuit Labanus, et quamvis ibi Com. 35, usurpantur adjec- 
tiva faeminei generis, tamen cap. xxxi. 8, eadem adjectiva de iisdem rebus 
in masculino usurpantur. 

* This is the opinion of R. Bechai, R. Solomon, R. Levi Ben Gerson, 
Aben-Ezra, and other Jewish writers, and of Cunaeus, Vatablus, Schindler, 
and other Christians. See Nicolai, Annot. in Cunaeum, lib. ii. cap. vi. It 
is likewise the opinion of Hottinger ; see his notes on Godwin. 

f Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. vi. sect. vi. cum not. Sheringham. torn. ii. 
p. 243, 244, edit. Surenhus. ; Targum Jonathan Ben Uziel in Lev. xvi. 10, 
apud Walton Polyglot, torn, iv.; Maimon. de Solenni Die Expiationum, 
cap. iii. sect. vii. p. 674, Crenii Fascicul. Septimi. 

I See Bochart. Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. liv. p. 653 ; Spencer, de 
Legibus, lib. iii. dissert, viii. cap. i. sect. i. p. 1040. 

§ Spencer, ubi supra, sect. ii. p. 1041. 

|| De (Econom. Feeder, lib. iv. cap. vi. sect. lxv. ixyi. p. 513, edit. 
Leovard. 1677; et iEgyptiaca, lib. ii. cap. ix. sect. iii. p. 120, Amstel. 
1696. 

f Comment, in Heb. ix. 25. 

** Alting. ad Lev. xvi. Oper. torn. i. p. 82, 83. 

ft Meyer, de Festis Hebraeor. part ii. cap. xv. sect. xvi. p. 315, 316. 



520 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III 



that gnazazel was the name of the devil, who was worshipped 
by the heathens, and particularly by the Egyptians, in the 
form of a goat. # Hence Juvenal saith of Egypt, 

Nefas iliic faetum jugulare capellae. 

Sat. xv. 1. 11. 

because there the goat was honoured as a god. 

According to this interpretation of gnazazel, it is supposed 
by some, that both the goats were typical of Christ, that which 
was sacrificed signifying his death, and the other which was 
sent to gnazazel, his being exposed to and overcoming the 
power of the devil. Dr. Patrick objects to this opinion, that 
though it hath been espoused by very great men, it is difficult 
to conceive, that, when the other goat was offered to God on 
his altar, this should be sent among the demons who delighted 
in desert places. Nor will it accord with the Hebrew text, 
which saith, this goat was for gnazazel, as the other was for 
the Lord. Now surely none will imagine, that both these 
goats being " set before," and presented to " the Lord," as 
equally consecrated to him, Lev. xvi. 10, he would order one 
of them for himself, and the other for the devil, especially as 
he soon after expressly commanded the Israelites " no more 
to offer their sacrifices unto devils," Dn^'i* sengnirim, " Hircis, 
sive Daenionibus hirci formibus;" Lev. xvii. 7. And though 
Spencer will not allow that the goat, which, he saith, was 
sent to gnazazel, or to the devil, was to be considered as a 
proper sacrifice to him, but only as being delivered into his 
power, and given up to his disposal ; nevertheless, as the for- 
mer goat, upon whom the lot to the Lord fell, was a sacrifice 
to the Lord, so the same expression being used concerning 
the goat on whom fell the lot to gnazazel, if the word gnazazel 
means a demon, it would seem to imply a sacrifice to that 
demon ; but granting the sending the goat to that demon w T as 
not properly a sacrifice, or an act of religious w r orship, it 
seems, however, to have been a rite, which might so easily 
have been interpreted into an encouragement of demon-wor- 

* Herodot. Euterp. cap. xlvi. p. 106, 107, edit. Gronov. ; Maimon. 
Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xlvi. p. 480. See various testimonies to 
the same purpose in Bochart. Hieroz. part i. lib. ii. cap. liii. p. 641, and 
part ii. lib. vi. cap. vii. p. 828. 830. Compare Lev. xvii. 7, and 2 Chron. 
xi. 15, in the Hebrew Q^T^^ sengnirim, hirci. 



CHAP. VIII.] 



THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 



521 



ship, that it is very difficult to conceive of it as a divine insti- 
tution. 

Upon the whole, though we cannot arrive at absolute cer- 
tainty in this matter, the first opinion appears most probable; 
and that, as the sacrifice-goat was typical of the expiation of 
sin by the sacrifice of Christ, the scape-goat, which was to 
have the sins of the people confessed over him, and as it were 
put upon him, and then to be sent away alive into some desert 
place, where they would see him no more, was intended to 
signify the effect of the expiation, namely, the removing of 
guilt, insomuch, that it should never more be charged on the 
once pardoned sinner.* 

The rites attending the public service of this day were chiefly 
performed by the high-priest, who had more to do on this than 
any other day of the year, or perhaps all the rest together. 
He was to kill and offer the sacrifices, and sprinkle their blood 
with his own hands; Lev. xvi. 11 — 15. He was dressed, 
therefore, in a manner suitable to this service, with only a 
single linen vest and breeches, and with a linen girdle and 
mitre; ver. 4. These the Jews called the white garments, as 
distinguished from the other four, which completed the pon- 
tifical habit, wherein the high-priest ministered on other occa- 
sions, and which were styled the golden garments, because 
they had a mixture of gold in them ; namely, the blue robe, 
adorned at the bottom with golden bells and pomegranates ; 
the embroidered ephod, with its curious girdle; the breast- 
plate, enriched with jewels set in gold ; and the golden fillet 
or crown upon the mitre. Whenever the high-priest ministered 
on other occasions, he was dressed in these eight garments. f 
On the day of expiation he wore only the four which were 
common to him and the other priests. Some conceive this was 
designed as a token of humility, this day being appointed for 
the confession of sins and for repentance. There was also 

* On this subject, see Frischniuthi Dissert, duee de Hirco Emissario,, 
apud Thesaur. Theolog. Philolog. torn. ii. p. 914, et seq.; Deylingii Obser- 
vat. Sacroe, part i. observ. xviii. de Hirco Emissario Christi Figura; 
Spencer, de Hirco Emissario, apud Leg. Hebraeor. lib. iii. dissert, viii.; 
and Bochart. Hieroz. part i. lib. ii. cap. liv. 

f See these garments described in Exod. xxviii., and above, book i. 
chap. v. p. 144 — 162. 



522 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



another good reason why he should on this occasion be dressed 
like an ordinary priest, because he was to do the work of one 
in killing and offering the sacrifices, which, being a laborious 
employment, required him to be thinly clad, and his upper 
garments to be laid aside. Besides, as some of it was but 
dirty work, performing it in these vestments, which were rich 
and finely embroidered, would have been altogether improper. 

The grand peculiarity in the service of this day, was the 
high-priest entering into the holy of holies, which was not 
permitted at any other time j Lev. xvi. 2, &c, compared with 
Heb. ix. 7. And as it was his peculiar privilege thus to draw 
nearer to God, or to the tokens of his special presence, to the 
ark, to the mercy-seat, and to the shechinah, than was al- 
lowed any other mortal, Philo makes him, on this occasion, to 
be transformed into somewhat more than man. To which 
purpose he cites a passage of Leviticus in the following man- 
ner : 'Orav — uani eig ra ayia tiov ayiwv, scilicet, 6 fizyagi zpevg, 
avSpwTrog ovk aarai fwc av e£eX0i]. " Quum ingressus fuerit, 
nempe magnus sacerdos, in sancta sanctorum, non erit homo, 
donee egressus fuerit."* But this conceit is built on a sad 
misrepresentation of the passage : for the words are these, Ilac 
av%pii)7rog ovk earai tv ty) <tki)v\i, " there shall be no man in the 
tabernacle when he," the high-priest, " goes in to make an 
atonement in the holy place;" Lev. xvi. 17. 

It is queried, whether on this day the high-priest entered 
more than once into the most holy place. It should seem, by 
the ritual in the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus, that he must 
do it three or four several times, in order to carry in, first, 
the censer full of burning coals in one hand, and the incense 
in the other, ver. 12: secondly, the blood of the bullock, 
which was sacrificed for himself and his house, ver. 14 ; thirdly, 
the blood of the goat of the sin-offering for the people, ver. 15; 
and it may be, fourthly, as the rabbi es say, to bring out 
the censer and the pot which contained the incense. Thus, 
according to them, he entered into the holy of holies, on this 
one day, four several times ;f whereas some Christian writers, 

* Philonis lib. secund. de Somniis, Oper. p. 880, F, edit. Colon. Allobr. 
1613. 

| Maimonides et Bartenora in Mishn. tit. Chelim. cap. i. sect. ix. torn, 
vi. p. 23; et Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. v. sect. i. p. 231; sect. iii. p. 234; 



chap. ^ in.] 



THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 



523 



on the contrary, have asserted, that he entered only once : 
supposing it to be so declared by the apostle, when he saith, 
" Into the second [tabernacle] went the high -priest alone once 
every year;"' Heb. ix. 7. Besides, they allege, that if he had 
entered oftener, he would have failed, in that particular, of 
being what the apostle represents him to be, a type of Christ,* 
" who entered once into the holy place;" ver. 12. 

To this it is replied, that the high-priest might properly 
enough be said to enter in only once, that is, one day in the 
year, though he entered in ever so many times on that day. 
In like manner all the male Israelites are said to appear before 
the Lord, or at the national altar, three times in the year, that 
is, at three different seasons, or on the three grand festivals. 
But no one would suppose thev were permitted to visit the 
temple no more than once at each of those festivals, especially 
considering that two of them lasted each for the space of a 
week.f 

The service performed by the high-priest in the inmost 
sanctuary was burning incense, and sprinkling the blood of 
the sacrifices before the mercy-seat, which he was to do with 
his finger seven times ; Lev. xvi. 14. The same number of 
sprinklings of the blood of the sin-offerings of the congregation 
is required on another occasion, chap. iv. 6; and likewise of 
the blood of the red heifer, which was burnt, in order to make 
the water of separation with its ashes; Numb. xix. 4. The 
same rite is prescribed for the cleansing of a leper, Lev.xiv. 
7 ; in dedicating the altar, chap. viii. 11 ; and at the consecra- 
tion of the priests, Exod. xxix. 21, compared with ver. 35. 
Some persons discover a great deal of mystery in this num- 
ber seven, observing that it is much used on other occasions. 
Jericho was besieged seven days, on each of which seven 
priests were to blow with seven trumpets; Josh.vi. Seven 

sect. iv. p. 235; cap. viii. sect. iv. p. 248, edit. Surenhus.; Maimon. de 
Soleimi Die Expiationum, cap. iv. sect. i. p. 681, sect. ii. p. 682, 683.686, 
Crenii Fascicul. Septimi. 

* See Wilkens de Functicme Pontificis Maxima ad Hebr. ix. 7. dissert, 
ii. cap. iii. praesertim a sect. x. ad fin. capitis, p. 763 — 765, torn. ii. The- 
sauri Theologico Philolog. 

+ Vid. Deylingii Observat. Sacrse, part ii. observ. xiii. sect. xvi. — xxx, 
p. 184—198. 



524 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



priests also blew with seven trumpets before the ark, when 
David brought it home ; 1 Chron. xv. 24. Naaman is or- 
dered by the prophet Elisha to wash himself in Jordan seven 
times ; 2 Kings v. 10. In the book of the Revelation we read 
of the seven spirits of God, chap. v. 6 ; of the book with seven 
seals, ver. 1 ; of seven angels with trumpets, chap. viii. 2 ; and 
of seven phials full of the wrath of God ; chap. xv. 7. Every 
seventh day was the sabbath ; every seventh year was a year 
of rest unto the land, in which there was no ploughing or sow- 
ing ; and seven times seven years brought the jubilee. Seven 
was also much regarded in the number of victims offered on 
extraordinary occasions. Job offered seven bullocks and 
seven rams for his friends ; Job xlii. 1. David sacrificed the 
same number of victims on occasion of his bringing the ark 
to the place he had prepared for it; 1 Chron. xv. 26. Heze- 
kiah offered victims by sevens, when he abolished idolatry, 
and restored the true religion ; 2 Chron. xxix. 21. Nay, it 
appears that the number seven was highly regarded, and 
thought of great efficacy in religious actions, not only by the 
Jews, but by the heathens. Balak, king of Moab, offered, 
•by the direction of Balaam, seven oxen and seven rams upon 
seven altars; Numb, xxiii. 1, 2. Apuleius saith, " Desirous 
of purifying myself, I wash in the sea, and dip my head seven 
times in the waves ; the divine Pythagoras having taught, 
that this number is above all others most proper in the con- 
cerns of religion. " # 

The high-priest is ordered to sprinkle the blood eastward, 
Lev. xvi. 14; in the appointment of which circumstance, like- 
wise, some have discovered a profound mystery ; that whereas 
the priests, in all the other parts of their service, turned their 
faces to the west, the high-priest, in performing this chief part 
of his ministry, disposed his face toward the east, " as turn- 
ing his back upon the beggarly elements of this world," and 
as representing him whose name is the East ; for so the Sep- 
tuagint and the Vulgate render the Hebrew word nD2f tsemach, 

* Apuleius de Asino Aureo, lib. xi. ad init. Those who would see more 
concerning the number seven, and its supposed mysteries, may read St. Je- 
rome on Amos v. 3, and Philo de Opificio Mundi, Oper. p. 15 — 21 ; de 
Legis Allegor. lib. i. p. 31 — 33; de Decalogo, Oper. p. 585, 586, edit. 
Colon. Allobr. p. 1613. 



CHAP. VI ll.] 



THE DAY OF EXPIATION. 



525 



in Zechariah vi. 12, "Behold the man whose name is," 
as we render it, " the Branch ;" but according to the 
versions just mentioned, avarokr), or oriens. However, 
the true reason of his sprinkling the blood eastward is evi- 
dently because the mercy-seat, before which he was to sprinkle 
it, stood on the east-side of the holy of holies, the side by 
the veil, which parted it from the sanctuary. It is said, *f he 
shall sprinkle it upon the mercy-seat, and before the mercy- 
seat;" by which one would think he sprinkled the mercy-seat 
itself with some of the blood. But the Jews unanimously un- 
derstand it otherwise ; and indeed syD^-hy gnal-pene, which 
we render "upon," may as well be translated "toward;" 
or, as we express it, " over against the face of the mercy- 
seat." The difference between sjD-by gnal-pene and Hp- 
pent, which we render "upon," and "before," is only this, 
that the former signifie stoward the top, and the latter toward 
the lower part of the mercy-seat.* 

The rabbies represent the high-priest as washing himself all 
over, and changing his dress several times during the service 
of this day, sometimes wearing the white and sometimes the 
golden vestments .f 

As to the spiritual or evangelical meaning of these rites, the 
apostle hath very particularly explained them in the ninth 
chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews. As the high-priest was 
a type of Christ, his laying aside those vestments which were 
" made for glory and for beauty," Exod.xxviii. 2, and appear- 
ing only in his w hite garments, might signify our Lord's state 
of humiliation, when he " laid aside the glory which he had 
with the Father before the world was," and " was made in 
fashion as a man." 

The expiatory sacrifices, offered by the high-priest, were 
typical of the true expiation which Christ made for the sins of 
his people by the sacrifice of himself ; and the priest's confess- 

* Deylingii Observat. Sacra, part ii. observ. xiii. sect. xxvi. xxvii. p. 194, 
195. 

f Vid. Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. vi. ; Mishn. tit. Joma, cap. iii. sect, 
iii. — vii. p. 218 — 221; cap. iv. sect. v. p. 230; cap. viii. sect. iii. iv. p. 247, 
248, torn. ii. Surenhus. ; Maimon. de Solenni Die Expiationum, cap. ii. 
sect. i. — vi. p. 658 — 662; cap. iv. sect. i. p. 678; sect. ii. p. 685, 686, 
Crenii Fascic. Septimi. 



526 



J I'.W 1SH ANTIQUITIES. 



[liOOK Iff 4 



ing the sins of the people over, and putting them upon the 
head of the scape-goat, Lev. xvi. 21, was a lively emblem of 
the imputation of sin to Christ, <( who was made sin for us," 
2 Cor. v. 21 ; for " the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of 
us all ;" Isa. liii. 6. And the goat's " bearing upon him all the 
iniquities of the Jews into a land not inhabited," Lev. xvi. 22, 
signifies the effect of Christ's sacrifice in delivering his people 
from guilt and punishment. The priest's entering into the 
holy of holies, with the blood of the sacrifice, is interpreted by 
the apostle to be typical of Christ's ascension and heavenly 
intercession for his people, in virtue of the sacrifice of his 
death.* 

f For a more particular account of the spiritual design of the rites attend- 
ing the service of the day of expiation, see Witsius de (Econom. Foederum, 
lib. it. cap. vi. sect, lviii. Concerning the day of expiation, see the com- 
mentators on the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus, particularly Ainsworth, 
Lightfoot's Temple Service, and the Mishnical tract Joma, with Shering- 
ham's notes. 



CHAPTER IX. 



OF THE SABBATICAL YEAR, OR SEVENTH YEAR'S 
REST. 

Among the wT^xa oro^aa, or beggarly elements of the 
Jewish dispensation, the apostle mentions days, and months, 
and times, and years, Gal. iv. 9, 10. For besides the weekly 
sabbath, or days of rest, the law prescribed the observance of 
the monthly new moons, and annual festival seasons, such as 
the passover, pentecost, feast of tabernacles, Sec, which are 
the Kaipoi, or times, to which the apostle refers; and likewise 
whole years, to be observed with peculiar regard after certain 
returning periods, such as every seventh year, called the 
sabbatical year : and every seven times seventh, styled the 
jubilee. 

It is the former which falls under our present considera- 
tion;* and in the law of Moses it is distinguished from all 
others by several names. It is sometimes called n^lii'n nw 
shanah hashebbignith, the seventh year, kot t^oxnv ; some- 
times {n^n rQltf sabbath haarets, the sabbath, or rest of the 
land; and sometimes TWth ntDOitf shemittah Laihovah, the re- 
lease of the Lord. 

The peculiar observances of this year were the four fol- 
lowing : 

1st. A total cessation from all manner of agriculture. 

2dly. Leaving all the spontaneous product of the ground to 
be used and enjoyed in common; so that no person was to 
claim any peculiar property. 

3dly. The remission of all debts from one Israelite to 
another. 

4thly. The public reading of the law at the feast of taber- 
nacles. 

* The institution of the sabbatical year is in Exod. xxiii. 10, 11; Lev. 
xxv. "2 — 7; Deut. xv. 1 — 18 : and xxxi. 10—13. 



528 



JEWISH A N T I Q V I T I E 



[book 111 



Before we consider these several particulars, there are two 
chronological questions to be briefly discussed : 

1st. From whence the computation of the sabbatical year 
commenced; and, 

2dly. At what season of the year it began. 

1st. It is made a question, from whence the computation 
of the sabbatical year commenced, or how soon it began to be 
observed by the Jews. In the general, it was when they came 
into the land of Canaan. For they received this command, 
while they were yet in the wilderness, " When ye come into 
the land which I give you, then shall the land keep a sabbath 
to the Lord;" Lev. xxv. 2. Nevertheless, it is far from being 
settled what year after their entrance into Canaan was ob- 
served as their first sabbatical year. Archbishop Usher* de- 
termines it to be the seventh year after the manna ceased, 
from which time the Israelites lived upon the fruits of the land 
of Canaan, Josh. v. 12; and six years being taken up in the 
conquest and division of the land, the seventh proved in all 
respects a year of rest, when they peaceably enjoyed the 
fruits of their victories, and of the country they had subdued. 

Nevertheless, others observing that the sabbatical year is 
enjoined to be observed after six years of agriculture, — " Six 
years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune 
thy vineyard, and gather in the fruit thereof ; but in the 
seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land," Lev. 
xxv. 3, 4; I say others for this reason conceive it more pro- 
bable, that the six years preceding the sabbatical year did not 
commence till after the conquest and division of the land. 
For it is not to be supposed, that they could apply themselves 
to agriculture till they had actually conquered it, or that they 
would do it till each man's property was assigned him. Now 
the year in which Joshua divided the land may be thus com- 
puted : Caleb was forty years old when Moses sent him from 
Kadesh-barnea to spy out the land, Josh. xiv. 7 ; and this was 
in the autumn of the second year from their exodos, or at the 
season when the grapes, pomegranates, and figs were ripe, of 
which the spies brought a sample with them ; Numb. xiii. 23. 
But Caleb was eighty-five years old at the time of the division 
of the land, Josh. xiv. 10; it was, therefore, forty-five years 

* Usser. Annales, A. M. 2554. 



CHAP. IX.] 



THE SABBATICAL YEAR. 



529 



since he went as a spy ; to which adding one year and a half 
before elapsed between that time and the exodos, and the di- 
vision of the land will appear to have been made in the forty- 
seventh year of their departure from Egypt ; from which sub- 
tracting forty years, the time of their wandering in the wilder- 
ness, Numb. xiv. 33, 34, and there remain six years and an 
half from their entrance into Canaan to the division of the 
land, which was completed the latter end of the summer; 
insomuch that every man's property was assigned him against 
the ensuing seed time, with which began the six years that 
preceded the first sabbatical year. Probably, therefore, the 
first sabbatical year was not kept till the fourteenth year from 
their entrance into Canaan.* 

2dly. The other chronological question is, at what season 
the sabbatical year began, whether with the month Nisan in 
the spring, orTisri in autumn; or, in other words, whether the 
sabbatical year was reckoned by the ecclesiastic or civil com- 
putation. 

This question, though not expressly determined by the 
Mosaic law, is, I apprehend, not very difficult to be de- 
cided. That the sabbatical year followed the civil computa- 
tion, beginning with the month Tisri, may be strongly inferred 
from a passage in the twenty-fifth chapter of Leviticus, ver. 
3, 4, where they are commanded to " sow their fields and 
prune their vineyards, and gather the fruit thereof, for six 
years successively, and to let the land rest," or lie fallow, 
** on the seventh." Doubtless, therefore, the seventh, or sab- 
batical year, began after the harvest and fruits were gathered 
in, and against the usual season of ploughing and sowing. It 
must then have begun in autumn ;f for had it begun with the 
month Nisan, they must have lost a crop of the last year's 
sowing, as well as have neglected the seed time for the next 
year ; which is inconsistent with the law in the twenty-third 
of Exodus, ver. 10, " Six years shalt thou sow thy land, and 
gather in the fruits thereof." 

We proceed to consider the particular observances of the 
sabbatical year. The 

First is, The total cessation from all manner of agriculture : 

* Maimon. de Anno Sabbatico et Jubilaeo, cap. x. sect. ii. 
f Mishn. Rosh Hashanah, cap. i. sect. i. p. 300, torn. ii. 
2 M 



530 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



" Thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard 
Lev. xxv. 4. If it be asked, what they were to live upon dur- 
ing this year, the answer is, 

1st. They were allowed to eat whatever the land and fruit- 
trees produced spontaneously, without ploughing and pruning ; 
only the proprietors of the ground and trees were not to look 
upon the product of that year as peculiarly their own, but all 
was to be in common; as will be showed under another 
head. Now some crop would rise this year from the corn 
shed in the last harvest, and from what was scattered in win- 
nowing, which they performed abroad in the fields. But, 

2dly. The question is best answered by God himself : " I 
will command my blessing upon you in the sixth year, and it 
shall bring forth fruit for three years," ver. 21 : that is, for 
part of the sixth, the whole seventh, and part of the eighth, 
till harvest come, reckoning the years to begin with Nisan. 
Thus one whole year and part of two others were called three 
years ; as one whole day and part of two others, during which 
our Saviour laid in the sepulchre, are termed three days and 
three nights, Matt. xii. 40, rptig Yifiepag Km rptig vvktclq, which 
is a Hebraism of the same import with the Greek word 
vvK^rifnepa, or three natural days. # 

This divine promise of an extraordinary blessing on the 
sixth year is doubtless to be understood conditionally, on sup- 
position of their obedience to the law of God. When there- 
fore they became neglectful on this head, and frequently re- 
volted to idolatry, it is reasonable to suppose God, in a great 
measure at least, withheld that extraordinary blessing . Where- 
upon, as one sin frequently leads to another, they also fre- 
quently neglected the observance of the sabbatical year. And 
on that account, as Mr. Mede observes, the Lord, agreeably 
to what he had foretold and threatened (Lev. xxvi. 34, com- 
pared with 2 Chron. xxxvi. 21), caused them to be carried 
captive, and the land to be waste for seventy years, without 
inhabitant, till it had fulfilled the years of sabbath which they 
observed not. For their idolatry he gave them into the hand 
of their enemies, the Gentiles ; and moreover, for their sab- 

* See Reland. Antiq. part iv. cap. i. sect. xx. xxi. p. 442 — 444, 3d edit. ; 
Kidder's Demonstration of the Messias, part i. chap. viii. p. 104; part ii. 
chap. iii. p. 61 — 64, 2d edit. fol. London, 1726. 



CHAP. IX.] 



THE SABBATICAL YEAR. 



531 



batical sacrilege, he caused them not only to be made cap- 
tives, but carried away into a strange country, and their land 
lay desolate for seventy years. * This making profit of their 
land on the sabbatical year, as well as not remitting debts 
upon that year, as the law enjoined them, was " the iniquity 
of their covetousness, for which the Lord was wroth with them, 
and smote them;" Isa. lvii. 17. Indeed, after they had been 
thus chastised for their disobedience, they grew superstitiously 
scrupulous, rather than religiously obedient, in observing the 
sabbatical year. Nevertheless, it does not appear God ever 
renewed the extraordinary blessing on the sixth year, which 
he first promised them, and they had shamefully forfeited. So 
that in after-ages the sabbatical year was always a year of 
scarcity. Hence, when Alexander the Great, by a wonder- 
ful providence, was diverted from his purpose of destroying 
Jerusalem, and, on the contrary, became most kindly disposed 
toward the Jews, bidding them ask what they had to desire 
of him ; they petitioned for an exemption every seventh year 
from paying tribute, because, according to their law, they then 
neither sowed nor reaped .+ Hence also our Saviour, fore- 
warning his disciples of the approaching calamities of Jeru- 
salem and Judea, whereby they would be obliged to quit their 
habitations and their country, advises them to pray that their 
flight might not be in the winter, nor <raj3j3arw, Matt. xxiv. 
20, which is most naturally to be understood of the sabbatical 
year; when provisions being scarce, would make it doubly 
inconvenient to be forced to travel and sojourn among 
strangers. 

Secondly, Another observance, belonging to the sabbatical 
year, was leaving the spontaneous product of the fields and 
fruit-trees to be used and enjoyed in common; so that no 
persons were to claim any peculiar property in them. For, 
although the product of this year was to be for the poor and 
the beast of the field, Exod. xxiii. 11, yet the proprietors of 
the fields and vineyards were not excluded from sharing it in 
common with others ; as appears from the following passage : 
" The sabbath of the land shall be meat for you, for thee and 

* Mede's Diatrib. discourse xxvii. p. 123, of his Works, 
f Joseph. Antiq. lib. xi. cap. viii.; or Prideaux's Connect, parti, book vu\ 
sub A, ante Christ. 332. 

2 m 2 



532 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 



for thy servant," Lev. xxv. 6, 7 : where the word sabbath 
means the fruit that grew on the sabbatical year ; as else- 
where, chap, xxiii. 38, the sabbaths of the Lord signify the 
sacrifices offered on the sabbath days. 

On this year, therefore, the whole land was one common 
field, in which none were considered as having any distinct 
property, but every rich and poor Israelite and foreigner who 
happened to be in the country, nay, men and beasts, were 
fellow-commoners. So that, as Maimonides saith, whoever 
locked up his vineyard or hedged in his field on the seventh 
year, broke a commandment; and so likewise, if he gathered 
in all his fruits into his house. On the contrary, all was to be 
free, and every man's hand alike in all places. # 

Since beasts are mentioned in the law as fellow-commoners 
with men, the Jews, according to Maimonides, were over- 
careful, that they should have an equal share with themselves. 
So that when there was no longer any fruit for the beasts of 
the field, they would not eat of what they had gathered for 
themselves, but threw it out of their houses. + 

Thirdly, The next observance, attending the sabbatical 
year, was the remission of all debts from one Israelite to ano- 
ther; Deut. xv. 1 — 3. The rabbies have devised such a num- 
ber of exceptions to this law, as in a manner wholly to defeat 
it. They say, for instance, he that lends upon a pawn, is not 
bound to release; that mulcts, or fines for defaming a man, 
&c, are not to be released; that if a man was cast at law 
in a certain sum to be paid to another, it was not to be re- 
leased ; and that if a man lent money on the express con- 
dition that the debt should not be released on the sabbatical 
year, he was not bound to release it. J 

Some of them will have the release to signify no more than 
that the debt should not be claimed in that year ; but that after 
the expiration of it, it might be demanded. § Thus they make 
void the commandment of God by their traditions; for the 
law seems plainly to require an absolute discharge of all debts 

* Maimon. de Anno Sabbatic, et Jubilaeo, cap. iv. sect. xxiv. 
f Maimon. ubi supra, cap. vii. 

X Misbn. tit. Shebingnitb, cap. x. prsesertim, sect, ii iv. p. 195,196, 

torn. i. 

§ Maimon. de Anno Sabbat, cap. ix. 



C HAP. IX.] 



THE SABBATICAL YEAR. 



533 



from one Israelite to another, though it did not extend to 
debts owing them by foreigners or heathens. The only point 
in this law, which can well bear dispute, is, at what time the 
discharge was to be given to the debtor, whether at the be- 
ginning or at the end of the year. Maimonides** understands, 
that it was not to be given till the end ; because it is said, 
" At the end of every seventh year ye shall make a release 
Deut. xv. 1. Others conceive, I apprehend on juster grounds, 
that the release took place at the beginning, or that the debtor 
was freed from his obligation as soon as the sabbatical year 
commenced. For in a parallel case, the release of a Hebrew 
servant, we find this phrase, " at the end of seven years," 
means in the seventh year, as soon as the six years' service 
was completed; see Deut. xv. 12. 18; compared with Jer. 
xxxiv. 14: "At the end of seven years let ye go every man 
his brother, an Hebrew, which hath been sold unto thee ; and 
when he hath served thee six years, thou shalt let him go free 
from thee." 

The whole seventh year, then, is called the end of the 
seven years, as being the last of the week of years ; in like 
manner as we call the whole Saturday the end of the week. 

Some also refer to the sabbatical year the release of the 
Hebrew servants, or slaves ; who had liberty to go out free 
on the seventh year. But in that case, the seventh year 
seems rather to mean the seventh from the beginning of their 
servitude ;f because it is said, " If thou buy an Hebrew ser- 
vant, six years he shall serve you, and in the seventh year he 
shall go free ;" Exod. xxi. 2. Again, " When he has served 
thee six years, then shalt thou let him go free from thee ;" 
Jer. xxxiv. 14. 

The year of manumission could not therefore be the sab- 
batical year, unless the servitude commenced immediately 
after the last sabbatical year. Although, therefore, the men- 
tion of the release of Hebrew servants may seem to be in- 
troduced in this place a little out of its proper course, we shall 
notwithstanding take this opportunity briefly to comment upon 
the law concerning them in the twenty-first chapter of Exodus, 
ver. 1 — 6. I would especially remark, that in case such a 

* Maimon. de Anno Sabbatic, et Jubilseo, cap. ix. sect. iv. 
f Maimon. de Servis, cap. ii. sect. ii. iii. 



534 



JEWISH 



ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK 111. 



servant, or slave, should voluntarily renounce his proffered 
liberty, and choose to abide with his old master, he was to be 
brought before the judges, that it might appear he was not 
forcibly or fraudulently detained against the law, but staid 
with his own consent, ver. 5, 6. Upon which his ear was to 
be bored with an awl to the door-post of his master's house, 
in token that he was now affixed to his house and service for 
life, or at least till the year of the jubilee. This Jewish cus- 
tom was borrowed by other nations ; particularly by the Ara- 
bians ; as appears from a passage of Petronius Arbiter,* 
where he introduces one Giton expressing himself in these 
terms : " Circumcide nos, ut Judsei videamur ; et pertunde 
aures, ut imitemur Arabes." Juvenal puts the following ex- 
pressions in the mouth of a Libertinus : 

Quamvis 

Natus ad Euphratem, molles quod in aure fenestra 
Arguerint, licet ipse negem. 

Satyr, i. 1. 104. 

It is generally supposed by the commentators, that the 
Psalmist refers to this rite in the fourth Psalm : " Sacrifice 
and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou 
opened," ver. 6 : " Or," as the margin translates the verb 
n^"D caritha, " my ears hast thou digged." But the apostle, 
quoting this passage, which he applies to Christ, renders it 
<rwjua Se KCLTvpTiGw fj.01, " a body hast thou prepared me," Heb. 
x. 5 : which is a quotation of the apostle's from the Septua- 
gint, though it manifestly differs from the Hebrew text ; and 
great use hath accordingly been made of it, to prove the au- 
thority of that version. It cannot, however, be easily ima- 
gined he would follow the Septuagint in preference to the 
Hebrew original, when he was writing to those who were 
Hebrews, and would probably object against such a citation. 
The commentators have endeavoured to show, that the quo- 
tation is made Kara Siavoiav, though not Kara \e%iv ; according 
to the sense, though not according to the letter.f 

The learned Mr. Pierce observes, that the authority of the 
Septuagint, and of an inspired apostle, should weigh more 

* Petron. Arbitri Satyricon, p. 364, edit. Michael, Hadrian. AmsteL 

1669. 

f See Whitby, Pool, &c. in loc. 



CHAP. IX.] 



THE SABBATICAL YEAR. 



535 



with us than that of our present Hebrew copies, which may 
have been corrupted through the mistake of transcribers, and 
that in this case the Hebrew should be corrected by the 
Greek. He conjectures, therefore, that the word D^tX osnaim, 
aures, was in the true copy rpJMN as-guph, tunc corpus. We 
have other instances of the like mistakes of joining two words 
in one. In the fifteenth verse of the third chapter of Isaiah, 
D'Db HO mah lachem, quid vobis, as it is in the keri, is made 
one word in the chetibh, D^D mallachem, which signifies 
their king; but in that place it carries no sense at all. As 
for the change of f)U guph into D<0 naim, it is not very im- 
probable, considering the similitude of the Ji gimel and 1 nun, 
the s jod and 1 vau, and the f) phe final, and D mem final ; for 
if the long stroke of the *) phe, below the line, was obscure, it 
might easily be mistaken for mem clausum. 

Indeed the word *)U guph is not found in the Hebrew 
Bible ; but we have nDtt guphah, the feminine ; and guph 
is frequently used by the rabbies. Perhaps, therefore, it might 
be an enra£ Xeyojiievov in the clause under consideration. How- 
ever, if that be disliked, we need only read m gevah, which 
the Seventy elsewhere render <ro>jua; see Job xx. 25. As for 
the verb m3 charah, Stockius shows its proper meaning is 
paravit.* So that, according to this conjectural criticism, the 
clause is literally rendered, by the Septuagint and by the 
apostle, au)fxa KarripTiab) fxoi, " a body hast thou prepared me." 

Dr. Doddridge t brings another solution of the words from 
Monsieur Saurin, who supposes that the Septuagint chose to 
explain the phrase of boring the ear by that of preparing the 
body for service ; as better known to those for whom the ver- 
sion was intended ; and therefore to be preferred also by the 
apostle, who, though he directs this epistle to the Hebrews, 
to whom the other custom might be well known, yet intended 
it for general use. J 

We return to the sabbatical year. The 

Fourth observance, which we mentioned, was the public 
reading of the law at the close of it at the feast of tabernacles, 
Deut. xxxi. 10, 11. As men's minds were now free from 

* See Stockii Clavis Vet. Test, in verb. 

f Doddridge in loc. 

t Saurin's Serm. vol. xi. p. 17 — 23. 



536 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 

cares by the release of their debts, it might be supposed they 
would the better attend to God's law. This, therefore, was a 
proper opportunity for the public reading it to the people. 

As for the general reason, on which the law concerning the 
sabbatical year was grounded, it was, no doubt, partly political 
and civil, to prevent the land being worn out by continual 
tilling;* partly religious, to afford the poor and labouring 
people more leisure one year in seven, to attend to devotional 
exercises; and partly mystical, typifying that spiritual rest, 
which Christ will give to all who come unto him; Matt. xi. 28. 
Some, both Jews and Christians, make the sabbatical year to 
be typical of the Millennium. For as the law consecrates the 
seventh day and the seventh year, they conclude the world 
will last six thousand years in the state in which we now see 
it ; or, as R. Elias in the Talmud expresses it, two thousand 
years without the law, two thousand under the law, and two 
thousand under the Messiah .f After which comes the grand 
sabbath of one thousand years. This notion, though it be 
perhaps without any sufficient ground, might be improved 
into an argument ad hominem, to convince the Jews that the 
Messiah must be already come ; since the world is gone far 
more than half way through the last two thousand years of 
the six thousand, allowed by their tradition for its continuance; 
during which period, therefore, if at all, must be the reign of 
the Messiah.} 

* Maimon. Moreh Nevoch. part iii. cap. xxxix.; Philo de Execrationi- 
bus, Oper. p. 724, B, C, edit. Colon. Allobr. 1613. 

f Vid. Cocceii, Sanhedrim et Maccoth, apud excerpt. Gemar. Sanhedr. 
cap. xi. sect. xxix. p. 346, ediuAmstel. 1629. 

% See on this subject the Commentators on Deut. xv., particularly Ains- 
worth ; see also Reland. Antiq. Hebr. part. iv. cap. viii. sect. xiii. — xvii. 



CHAPTER X. 



THE JUBILEE. 

The jubilee was the grand sabbatical year, celebrated after 
every seven septenaries of years; namely, every forty-ninth 
or fiftieth year. This was a year of general release, not only 
of all debts, like the common sabbatical year, but of all slaves ; 
and of all lands and possessions which had been sold, or other- 
wise alienated from the families and tribes to which they 
originally belonged . # 

The critics are not agreed about the etymology of the word 
b2V> Jobel. Some derive it from Jubal, who was the inventor 
of musical instruments, Gen. iv. 21; and suppose, that this 
year was named after him, because it is a year of mirth and 
joy, on which music is a common attendant; or, as we say in 
English, a jovial time, the word jovial being perhaps a cor- 
ruption of the Hebrew word Jobel ; or else, because it was 
ushered in with the musical sound of the trumpet through the 
whole land.f Others, particularly R. David Kimchi, tell us, 
that Jobel signifies a ram in the Arabic ; and that this year 
was so called, because it was proclaimed with trumpets made 
of rams' horns.f With him the rabbies in general agree. § 
Bochart, however, is of opinion, there were never any 
trumpets made of rams' horns, they being very unsuitable for 
such a purpose, and that the phrase D^V^n nnsittf shopheroth 
hajjobhelim, which, in the sixth chapter of Joshua, ver. 4, 
we render trumpets of rams' horns, means only such trumpets 

* See the institution of this festival, in Lev. xxv. 8 — 17. 
f See Mafius ad Josh. vi. 4, apud Critieos Sacros. 
J R.D. Kimch. in Lev. xxv. 

§ R. S. Jarchi in Lev. xxv.; and the Chaldee Paraphrast sometimes ex- 
plains Jobel by NID^T dichra, a ram, particularly in Josh. vi. 4» 



538 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK 111. 



as were to be used in proclaiming the jubilee; which, it is 
far more probable, were made of the horns of oxen than of 
rams. # 

Hottinger is of opinion,f that Jobel is a word invented to 
imitate the sound of the instrument, and that it does not 
therefore signify the trumpet itself, but the sound it made 4 
Dr. Patrick espouses this etymology, and conceives this year 
was called Jobel from the sound then everywhere made; 
as the feast of the passover was styled Pesach, from the 
angel's passing over the Israelites when he slew the Egyp- 
tians. § 

There is another opinion, which bids as fair for probability 
as any of the former, that Jobel comes from by* jabal, in 
hiphily Snn hobil, which signifies to recall, restore, bring back, 
&c, because this year restored all slaves to their liberty, and 
brought back all alienated estates to the families to which they 
originally belonged. || Accordingly the Septuagint renders 
Jobel, afeaiQ, a remission, Lev. xxv. 10; and Josephus saith 
it signifies eXevOepiav, liberty.^ 

As the learned are not agreed about the etymology of the 
name, so neither about the year in which the festival was to 
be celebrated ; whether every forty-ninth, or every fiftieth ; 
and it is hard to say, which of these opinions hath the most 
eminent, or the most numerous advocates. On the former 
side are Joseph Scaliger, ## Petavius,ft Jacobus Capellus,JJ 

* Bochart. Hierozoic. part i. lib. ii. cap. xliii. Oper. torn. ii. p. 425, 
426. 

f Joh. Hen. Hottinger. Analect. Historico-Theolog. dissert, iii.; et Joh. 
Hen. Hottinger. jun. Annot. in Godwin. 
I See Exod. xix. 13, and other places. 
§ Patrick on Lev. xxv. 10. 

|| Fuller. Miscell. Sacr. lib. iv. cap. viii. apud Criticos Sacros, torn, 
ix. 

% Joseph. Antiq. lib. iii. cap. xii. sect. iii. p. 184. 

** Scaliger de Emendat. Tempor. lib. vii. p. 782, D, Colon. Allohr. 
1629; Canon. Isagog. lib. i. p. 55, ad calcem Thesaur. Tempor. Amstel. 
1658; et Animadvers. in Chronic. Eusebii, p. 15. 

ft Petav. Rational-, Tempor. part. ii. lib. ii. cap. vii. p. 87, et seq. edit. 
Paris, 1673 ; et de Doctrin. Tempor. lib. ix. cap. xxvii. 

It Jacob. Capell. Histor. Sacr. et Exotic, ad A. M. 2549. 



CHAP. X.] 



THE JUBILEE. 



539 



Cunseus,* Spanheim,f Usher,$ Le Clerc§, and many others ; 
on the latter, the Jews in general,|| many of the Christian 
fathers, and among the moderns, Fagius,^ Junius, ## Hot- 
tinger,ft Schindler,JJ Leidekker,§§ Leusden,|||| Meyer,^ 
Calmet,[*] &c. 

The ground of the former opinion is chiefly this, that the 
forty-ninth year being of course a sabbatical year, if the jubilee 
had been kept on the fiftieth, the land must have had two 
sabbaths, or must have lain fallow two years together, since 
all agriculture was forbid on the jubilee, as well as on the 
sabbatical year. 

Now this is thought an unreasonable supposition, since in 
all likelihood, without a miracle, it must have produced a 
dearth. If the law, therefore, had carried any such inten- 
tion, one might have expected a special promise, that the 
forty-eighth year should bring forth fruit for four years, as 
there was, that the sixth year should bring forth fruit for 
three. 

On the other hand it is alleged, that the Scripture declares 
for the fiftieth year, Lev. xxv. 10, 11 : " And ye shall hallow 
the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land 

* Cunseus de Republ. Hebr. lib. i. cap. vi. p. 54, et seq. 

f Spanheim. Chronolog. Sacra, part. i. cap. xvi. p. 84 — 86, apud Oper. 
Geograph. Chronolog. et Histor. Lugd. Bat. 1701. 

X Usser. Annal. A. M. 2609 Jubilseus Primus ; A. M. 2658 Jubilseus Se- 
cundus, see p. 24; A. M. 2707 Jubilseus Tertius, p. 25, edit. Genev. 
1722. 

§ Cleric, in Lev. xxv. 10. 

|| See Chaldee Paraphrast on Lev. xxv. ; Maimon. de Anno Sabbatico et 
Jubileo, cap. x. sect, vii.; R. Menachem in Lev. xxv. 

1[ Fagius in Lev. xxv. 10. ** Junius et Tremellius in loc. 

ft Hottinger. Annot. in Godwin, lib. iii. cap. x. sect. xi. annot. i. p. 635, 
636. 

XX Schindler. Lexic. Pentaglot. in verb 

§§ Leidekker. de Republ. Hebrseor. lib. v. cap. xiv. sect. iv. p. 323, 
Amstel. 1704. 

(Ill Leusden. Phiiolog. Hebrseo-mixt. dissert, xli. p. 290, edit. Ultrajecti, 
1682. 

ITU Meyer, de Tempor. et Fest. Hebrseor. part. ii. cap. xviii. sect. vii. — ■ 
xlix. p. 343—358, 2d edit. Amstel. 1724, where he considers the argument 
at large. 

[*] Calmet on the word Jubilee. 



540 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[book HI. 



unto all the inhabitants thereof ; it shall be a jubilee unto you, 
and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall 
return every man unto his family; a jubilee shall that fiftieth 
year be unto you." Besides, if the law had meant, that the 
forty-ninth should be the jubilee, there would have been no 
need of forbidding sowing, reaping, &c., on the jubilee, be- 
cause, that being the sabbatical year, it was forbidden in the 
preceding law relating to that year; Lev. xxv. 4, 5. 

As to the supposed dearth, the gentlemen on this side of 
the question conceive, there could be no danger of that while 
God protected the nation by a special providence ; and espe- 
cially since we have an instance of their living without any 
harvest for two years together, when the Assyrians had 
trodden down or spoiled the crop of one year, and the next 
was probably a sabbatical year ; and yet there was no famine, 
but they had sufficient to eat of that which grew of itself ; 
2 Kings xix. 29. 

The authors of the Universal History have endeavoured to 
reconcile these two opinions; observing, that as the jubilee 
began on the first month of the civil year, which was the 
seventh of the ecclesiastical, it might be said to be either the 
forty-ninth or fiftieth, according as the one or the other of 
these different computations was followed. # 

The jubilee began on the tenth day of the month Tizri, at 
the evening of the day of atonement; Lev. xxv. 9. A time, 
saith Dr. Patrick, very fitly chosen; for they would be better 
disposed to forgive their brethren their debts, when they had 
been craving pardon of God for their own. To which we 
may add, that when their peace was made with God by the 
sacrifices of atonement, it was the proper time to proclaim 
liberty and joy throughout the land. 

The peculiar observances of the jubilee, beyond those of the 
common sabbatical year, were the following : — 

1st. That it was proclaimed by the sound of the trumpet 
throughout the whole land. Maimonides saith, every private 
man was to blow with a trumpet, and make a sound nine 
times /f* 

* Universal History, Hist, of the Jews, book ii. chap, vii., Laws relating 
to the Jubilee, note R. 

f Maimon. de Anno Sabbat, et Jubilseo, cap. x. 



CHAP. X.] 



THE JUBILEE. 



541 



* 2dly. The jubilee was a year of general release of all slaves 
and prisoners. Even such as had voluntarily relinquished 
their freedom, at the end of their six years' service, and had 
had their ears bored in token of perpetual servitude, were yet 
set free at the jubilee ; for " then they were to proclaim liberty 
throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof ;" Lev. 
xxv. 10. 

3dly. In this year all estates which had been sold, were 
returned back to their former proprietors, or to the families to 
which they originally belonged ; by which means it was pro 
vided, that no family should be sunk and ruined, and doomed 
to perpetual poverty ; for the family estate could not be alie- 
nated for longer than fifty years. The nearer, therefore, the 
jubilee was, the less was the value of the purchase of an 
estate, ver. 15. This law of the Jews was famous among the 
Heathens, some of whom copied after it. Diodorus Siculus 
saith, it was not lawful for the Jews, rove i&ovg jcXtjoouc 7rti)\av, 
to sell their own inheritances ; # and Aristotle, in his Politics,f 
saith of the Locrians, that they were prohibited by their laws 
from selling their ancient possessions. 

The reason and design of the law of the jubilee was partly 
political and partly typical. 

1st. It was political, to prevent the too great oppression of 
the poor, as well as their being liable to perpetual slavery. 
By this means the rich were prevented from accumulating 
lands upon lands, and a kind of equality was preserved through 
all their families. Never was there any people so effectually 
secured of their liberty and property, as the Israelites were ; 
God not only engaging so to protect those invaluable bless- 
ings by his providence, that they should not be taken away 
from them by others; but providing in a particular manner, 
by this law, that they should not be thrown away through 
their own folly ; since the property, which every man or family 
had in their dividend of the land of Canaan, could not be sold 
or any way alienated for above half a century. By this means 
also the distinction of tribes was preserved, in respect both to 
their families and possessions ; for this law rendered it ne- 

* Diod. Sicul. lib. xl. eclog. prim. p. 922, edit. Hanov. 1604. 
t Arist. Politic, lib. ii.cap. vii.; see also lib. vi. cap. iv. 



542 JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. [BOOK III. 

cessary for them to keep genealogies of their families, that 
they might be able, when there was occasion, on the jubilee 
year, to prove their right to the inheritance of their ancestors. 
By this means it was certainly known, of what tribe and family 
the Messias sprung. Upon which Dr. Allix observes, that 
God did not suffer them to continue in captivity out of their 
own land for the space of two jubilees, lest by that means 
their genealogies should be lost or confounded. 

A farther civil use of the jubilee might be for the readier 
computation of time. For, as the Greeks computed by olym- 
piads, the Romans by lustra, and we by centuries, the Jews 
probably reckoned by j ubilees ; and it might, I say, be one 
design of this institution to mark out these large portions of 
time for the readier computation of successive years of ages. 

2dly. There was also a typical design and use of the jubilee, 
which is pointed out by the prophet Isaiah, when he saith, in 
reference to the Messiah, " The Spirit of the Lord God is 
upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good 
tidings unto the meek ; he hat hsent me to bind up the broken- 
hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening 
of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the accepta- 
ble year of the Lord/' chap. lxi. 1, 2; where " the acceptable 
year of the Lord," when " liberty was proclaimed to the cap- 
tives," and " the opening the prison to them that were bound," 
evidently refers to the jubilee; but, in the prophetic sense, 
means the gospel state and dispensation, which proclaims 
spiritual liberty from the bondage of sin and Satan, and the 
liberty of returning to our own possession, even the heavenly 
inheritance, to which, having incurred a forfeiture by sin, we 
had lost all right and claim. 

I have only farther to observe, that this jubilee of the Jews 
hath been in some sort imitated by the Pope ; who, after a 
certain returning period, proclaims a jubilee, in which he 
grants a plenary indulgence to all sinners, at least to as many 
as visit the churches of St. Peter and St. Paul at Rome. 

The jubilee was first established by Pope Boniface VIII., 
anno 1300, and was only to return every hundredth year; but 
the first celebration brought such stores of wealth to Rome, 
that Clement VI. reduced the period to fifty years ; afterward 



CHAP. X.] 



THE JUBILEE. 



543 



Urban VI. appointed the jubilee to be held every thirty-five 
years j and Sextus IV. brought it down to twenty-five.* 

One of our kings, Edward III., caused his birth-day, when 
he was fifty years of age, but neither before nor after, to be 
observed in the manner of a jubilee ; this he did by releasing 
prisoners, pardoning all offences, treason itself not excepted, 
and granting many privileges to the people .f 

* See on this subject, Dieteric. Antiq. Biblicae, ex Lev. xxv. 4, p. 220, 
et seq. edit. Gissae et Francof. 1 67 1 . 

f Polydor. Virgil. Histor. Anglican, lib. xix. p. 494, Lugd. Bat. 1651, 



CHAPTER XI. 



THE FEASTS OF PURIM AND OF DEDICATION. 

Besides the sacred festivals already considered, no other 
were appointed by the law of Moses. However, the Jews, in 
process of time, added several others : two of which are to be 
the subject of this chapter ; namely, the feast of purim, of the 
occasion and institution of which we have an account in the 
book of Esther, chap.ix. 20 — ult. ; and the feast of dedica- 
tion, mentioned by the evangelist John, chap. x. 22. They 
were both of them annual festivals, and observed in comme- 
moration of national mercies and deliverances. 

The former, the feast of purim, was instituted by Mordecai, 
to commemorate the deliverance of the Jews from Hainan's 
conspiracy, of which we have an account in the book of 
Esther. Many suppose, that in this he had a special direction 
from God, delivered by some prophet, perhaps Haggai, or 
Malachi. But if so, it is strange that the sanction of divine 
authority should not be expressly stamped on the institution, 
and that the name of God should not be mentioned so much 
as once in the history of it, or of the events relating to it. 
Thus much is certain, it hath had the effect, which mere hu- 
man institutions in matters of religion very commonly have, 
to occasion corruption and licentiousness of manners, rather 
than to promote piety and virtue. Though still celebrated by 
the Jews with great ceremony, it is a time of general riot 
and debauchery ; and they make it a sort of rule of their re- 
ligion to drink till they can no longer distinguish between the 
blessing of Mordecai and the cursing of Haman. # Insomuch 

* Talmud cod. Megillah, fol. 7. 2, quoted by Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, 
cap. xxix. p. 559, 3d edit, in Lexic. Talmud, sub voc. P- 324; and by 

Leusden. Philolog. Hebrseo-mixt. dissert, xl. p. 285, 2d edit. Ultraject. 
1682. 



CHAP. XI.] 



THE FEAST OF PURIM. 



545 



that Archbishop Usher very justly styles the feast of purim 
the Bacchanalia of the Jews. # 

This festival was to be kept two days successively, the four- 
teenth and fifteenth of the month Adar ; Esth. ix. 21. In the 
intercalatory year, therefore, when there are two Adars, it is 
kept twice over;t the first time with less ceremony, which 
they call the little purim ; the second, in the Veadar, with more 
ceremony, which they term the great purim. J On both days 
of the feast the modern Jews read over the Megillah, or book 
of Esther, in their synagogues. The copy there read must 
not be printed, but written on vellum in the form of a roll ; 
and the names of the ten sons of Haman are written in it in 
a peculiar manner, being ranged, they say, like so many 
bodies hanging on a gibbet. The reader must pronounce all 
these names in one breath. Whenever Hainan's name is 
pronounced, they make a terrible noise in the synagogue; 
some drum with their feet on the floor, and the boys have 
mallets, with which to knock and make a noise. § They pre- 
pare themselves for their carnival by a previous fast, which 
should continue three days, in imitation of Esther's (chap.iv. 
16) ; but, for the generality, they have reduced it to one day.|| 

We may here take occasion to consider three questions, 
started upon the story to which this festival relates. 

1st. When, and in whose reign, the affair happened, which 
it is intended to commemorate. 

2dly. For what reason Mordecai refused to pay that respect 
to Haman, the neglect of which so much incensed him against 
the Jews. 

3dly. Why Haman cast lots, in order to fix the day for the 
massacre of the Jews. 

First. The first question is, when, and in what king's reign, 
this affair happened. Though it was doubtless after the king- 
dom of Judah returned from its captivity, yet the ten tribes 
still continued in their dispersion, from which they have not 

* Usser. Annales, sub A. M. 3495, p. 88, edit. Genev. 1722. 

f Mishn. tit. Megillah, cap. i. sect. iv. torn. ii. p. 389. 

X Buxtorf. Synag. lib. xxix. sub fin. 

§ Buxtorf. Synag. Judaic, cap. xxix. p. 555 — 558. 

|| Hottinger in Godwin, lib. iii. cap. xi. annot. i. p. 643. 

2 N 



546 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES 



[BOOK III 



been recovered to this day. Accordingly the Jews are said, 
at that time, to have been dispersed through all the provinces 
of Ahasuerus's kingdom, " who reigned from India even to 
Ethiopia, over one hundred twenty and seven provinces ;" 
Esth. i. 1; iii. 8. But who this Ahasuerus was, is a ques- 
tion upon which chronologers are much divided. Usher * 
takes him to be Darius the son of Hystaspes, who promoted 
the building of the temple at Jerusalem; Ezra vL Scaliger 
thinks it was Xerxes, who was Darius's successor .f J. Ca- 
pellusj is persuaded this Ahasuerus was Ochus, one of the 
last kings of Persia; for in his reign Alexander the Great 
was born, who brought the Persian empire to its period. 
Dr. Patrick, in support of this opinion, observes, that Ochus's 
Persian name was Achash, to which Verosh being added as 
his sirname, he was called by the Persians Achas-verosh, 
which the Greeks translated Ahasuerus. § Rollin|| supposes 
him to have been Cambyses. I take the opinion of Pri- 
deaux^f to be the most probable of any, that Ahasuerus was 
Artaxerxes Longimanus; through whose favour to the Jews 
Ezra and Nehemiah completed the restoration of the kingdom 
of Judah, and rebuilt Jerusalem. It is likely his extraordi- 
nary kindness to that people was owing to the influence of his 
queen Esther: it is particularly remarked, that when Nehe- 
miah obtained his commission to rebuild and fortify Jerusalem, 
the queen was sitting by; Xehem. ii. 6. 

As for the name iinil-fcTTN Achash-verosk, it seems rather to 
have been a title common to the kings of Media and Persia, 
than a proper name of any of them. It is evidently com- 
pounded of the Persic word trntt achash, dignitas, which the 
rabbies commonly use for magnus, and EfSTI rosh, caput, sum- 
mitas, dux, princeps.** So that Achash-verosh signifies 

* Usser. Aimal. A. M. 3483, p. 85. 

f Scalig. de Emendat. Tempor. p. 585, et seq. praesertim, p. 591 — 593. 
X Histor. Sacr. et Exotic. A. M. 3640 et 3650. 
§ Patrick on Esth. i. 1 . 

|| Rollin's Ancient History, vol. ii. book iv. chap. ii. 

II Prideaux's Connect, part. i. book iv. sub anno ante Christ. 465, p. 361 
— 364, vol. i. 10th edit.; see also Clerici Annot. in Esth. i. 1. 

** Vid. Pfeifferi Exercitationes ad calcera Dubior. Vexator. exereitat. iii. 
de Lingua Protoplast, p. 67, 3d edit. Lipsise, 



CHAP. XI.] 



THE FEAST - OF PURIM. 



547 



magnum caput, sive magnus princeps ; and was, as some 
think, tiomen gentilitium, the name of all their kings, as 
Pharaoh was of all the kings of Egypt. Accordingly this 
name or title is also given, as is commonly thought, to Cam- 
byses, in the fourth chapter of Ezra, ver. 6. Nevertheless, 
it might be given to Artaxerxes, tear t^o^rjv. The 

Second question is, for what reason Mordecai refused to 
pay that respect to Haman, the neglect of which so much in^ 
censed him against the Jews; Esth. iii. 1 — 6. 

This question can be only answered conjecturally. Some 
think the reason was, because Haman was an Amalekite ; and 
the Israelites had been commissioned from God to destroy 
that whole nation, because of the inj uries they had formerly 
done them ; Deut. xxv. 17 — 19. But this hardly seems to be 
a sufficient account of Mordecai's refusing civil respect to 
Haman, who was first minister of state ; especially when by 
so doing he exposed his whole nation to imminent danger. 
Besides, if nothing but civil respect had been intended to 
Haman, the king need not have enjoined it on his servants 
after he had made him his first minister and chief favourite, 
Esth. iii. 1,2; they would have been ready enough to show it 
on all occasions. Probably, therefore, the reverence ordered 
to be paid this great man was a kind of divine honour, such 
as was sometimes addressed to the Persian monarchs them- 
selves ; which being a species of idolatry, Mordecai refused it 
for the sake of a good conscience. And perhaps it was Ra- 
man's understanding that his refusal was the result of his 
Jewish principles, that was the very thing which determined 
him to attempt the destruction of the Jews in general, know- 
ing they were all of the same mind. As to the 

Third question, why Haman cast lots, in order to fix the 
day for the massacre of the Jews, Esth. iii. 7 ; from whence 
the feast of purim, which is a Persic word, and signifies lots,* 
took its name, chap. ix. 26; it was no doubt owing to the 
superstitious conceit, which anciently prevailed, of some days 
being more fortunate than others for any undertaking; in 
short, he endeavoured to find out, by this way of divining, 

* Vid. Pfeifferi Dubia Vexat. centur. iii. loc. xxix. p. 486, 487, 3d edit, 
Lipsiae. 

2 n 2 



548 



JEWISH A N T I Q V I T I E S . 



[book nr. 



what month, and what day of the month, was most unfortunate 
to the Jews, and most fortunate for the success of his bloody 
design against them. It is very remarkable, that while Haman 
sought for direction in this affair from the Persian idols, the 
God of Israel so over-ruled the lot as to fix the intended 
massacre to almost a year's distance, from Nisan the first 
month to Adar the last of the year, in order to give time and 
opportunity to Mordecai and Esther to defeat the conspiracy. 
Thus much for the feast of purim. # 

The feast of dedication is in Greek termed tyicaivia, John 
x. 22, from tyKaiviZw, renovo, instauro ; a word commonly 
used by the ancient Christian writers for an annual festival 
kept in commemoration of the building of cities, or dedica- 
tion of churches. Thus Codinus, in his Origines Constanti- 
nopolis, saith, ra eyicaivia rrjc 7to\eu)q ytyove km Trpoazyoptvdr) 
KtovcTTavTivoviroXig, — " Encoenia urbis fuerunt celebrata, et 
Constantinopolis fuit appellata;"f and Eusebius, in his Ec- 
clesiastical History, speaks of the syKaiviuv £0/orat,J meaning 
the feasts of the dedication of churches. There is no doubt 
the sytcaivia, mentioned by St. John, were celebrated in com- 
memoration of the dedication of the temple. Now the season 
of the year when this festival was observed, will enable us 
easily to determine what dedication of the temple it must 
refer to. The evangelist saith, " it was then winter it could 
not therefore be observed in commemoration of the dedication 
of Solomon's temple ; for that was in the seventh month, or 
autumn, 1 Kings viii. 2 ; nor of the second, or Zerubbabel's 
temple ; for that was in the month Adar, in the spring ; Ezra 
vi. 15, 16. The festival here intended must, therefore, be 
that instituted by Judas Maccabeus, on his having purified 
the temple and the altar from the pollution of Antiochus 
Epiphanes, which was celebrated for eight days successively, 
in the month Chislau, about the winter solstice ; 1 Mace. iv. 
52 — 59. It is mentioned by Josephus as a festival much 
regarded in his time.§ 

* See, on this subject, Schickard. Oratiuncula de Festo Purim, apud Cri- 
ticos Sacros, torn viii. f See Suicer. Thesaur. ad voc. Bynaivia. 

X Euseb. Eccles. Hist. lib. x. cap. hi. p. 463, 464, edit. Cantab. 1720. 
§ Antiq. lib. xii. cap. vii. sect. vii. p. 617, edit. Havercamp. 



CHAP. XI.] THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 



549 



The circumstance of Christ's walking in the temple at this 
feast, John x. 23, is alleged by Dr. Nichols,* Prideaux,f 
and others, in favour of the observance of sacred festivals of 
mere human institution ; for though this was such an one, 
nevertheless Christ honoured it with his presence. But how 
will this prove, that our Lord had a more sacred or religious 
regard to this festival than it may be proved he had to the 
winter, from his walking in the temple at that season ? Or if 
he chose to come to Jerusalem and to the temple at that time, 
when more people frequented the temple service than ordi- 
narily at any other, the only reason might be the opportunity 
of preaching to greater numbers ; on which account we find 
the apostles likewise frequented the synagogues upon the 
Jewish sabbath, even after that institution was abrogated.^ 

Besides these two festivals, we read in Scripture of several 
other feasts, or fasts, observed by the Jews in later ages, 
though not appointed by the law of Moses ; as the fast of the 
fourth month, on account of the taking of Jerusalem by the 
Chaldeans, Jer. lii. 6, 7 ; of the fifth month, on account of 
their burning the temple and city, 2 Kings xxv. 8 ; of the 
seventh month, in memory of the murder of Gedaliah, ver. 
25; and of the tenth month, when the Babylonian army began 
the siege of Jerusalem; Jer. lii. 4. These fasts are alt men- 
tioned together in the eighth chapter of Zechariah, ver . 19 : 
to which we may perhaps add the feast, which Josephus calls 
%v\o<l>opLa, the feast of the wood-ofTering, when the people 
brought great store of wood to the temple for the use of the 
altar. § This is said to be grounded on the following passages 
in Nehemiah : " We cast the lots among the priests, the 
Levites, and the people, for the wood-ofTering, to bring it 
into the house of our God, after the houses of our fathers, at 
times appointed year by year, to burn upon the altar of the 
Lord our God, as it is written in the law ;" chap. x. 34. 

* Nicholsii Defensio Eccles. Anglican, part ii. cap. xi. p. 298, 299, Lon- 
dini, 1707. 

f Connect, partii. book iii. vol. iii. p. 278, 279, 10th edit. 
I Vid. Peircii Vindic. Fratrum Dissent, part iii. cap. xi. p. 381, Londini, 
1710, or the English Translat. part iii. chap. xi. p. 218, London, 1717. 
§ Joseph, de Bell. Judaic, lib. ii. cap. xvii. sect. vi. p. 194, Havercamp, 



550 



JEWISH ANTIQUITIES. 



[BOOK III. 



Again, " I appointed the wards of the priests and the Levites, 
every one in his business; and for the wood-offering at times 
appointed, and for the first-fruits;" chap. xiii. 30, 31. 

Besides these fasts and festivals, the modern Jewish ca- 
lendar is crowded with a multitude of others ;* of which, there 
being no mention of them in Scripture, it is beside our purpose 
to take any farther notice. 

* Vid. Selden. de Synedriis Hebneov. lib. iii. cap. xiii. sect. xii. 



APPENDIX, 

CONCERNING 

THE LANGUAGE OF THE JEWS. 



ON 



THE LANGUAGE OF THE JEWS, 



Xo the large account given of the Jews and their religion, 
chiefly from the sacred records of the Old Testament, I shall 
now subjoin a dissertation on the languages in which those 
records were written ; namely, the Hebrew and the Chaldee. 
However, as only a small part of the later writings are in 
Chaldee, our chief attention will be paid to the Hebrew. 
And here we shall consider, 

1st. The antiquity of the language ; and, 

2dly. The language itself. 

First, As to its antiquity. The Jews are very confident it 
was the first and original language, which, they say, was con- 
trived by God himself, and which he inspired Adam with a 
complete knowledge of. # Accordingly those words, which 
we translate " Man became a living soul," Gen. ii. 7, are 
rendered in the Chaldee Paraphrase of Jonathan, "The 
breath, breathed into him by God, became in man a speak- 
ing soul." And to the same purpose the Paraphrase of On- 
kelos. But notwithstanding the confident assertions of the 
Jews, there are other persons who have taken the liberty to 
doubt of this opinion, not only as to the high antiquity of 
the Hebrew language, but as to such a divine original of any 
language at all. 

1st. As to the original of language itself. Though the 
Jews assert their language was taught to Adam by God him- 

* Vid. Buxtorf. Dissertationes Philologico-Theolog. dissert, i. de Ling, 
Hebr. Orig. et Antiquit. sect. xvii. p. 11 — 14 ; sect. xxx. p. 20—23, Basil 
1662. 



554 



THE ORIGINAL LANGUAGE. 



self, yet they are not all agreed how far the divine institution 
reached. Abarbanel supposes, God instructed our first pa- 
rents only in the roots and fundamental parts of the tongue, 
and left the further improvement to themselves : # but others, 
that they received the whole extent and propriety of the lan- 
guage by immediate revelation.f The same opinion hath 
been embraced by several Christians, particularly by Euno- 
mius, who, because God is introduced by Moses as speaking 
before the creation of man, maintained that there was in 
words a certain eternal and immutable nature. But it is dif- 
ficult to conceive what connexion there can be, for the most 
part, between sounds and things, except what is arbitrary, 
and fixed by consent or custom. J And Gregory Xyssen ex- 
poses it as ridiculous and blasphemous to imagine God w 7 ould 
turn grammarian, and set him down subtilely to invent names 
for things. § Dr. Shuckford|| conceives, that the original of 
our speaking was indeed from God ; not that he put into 
Adam's mouth the very sounds which he designed he should 
use as the names of things ; but only, as he made him with 
the powers of a man, he had the use of an understanding to 
form notions in his mind of things about him, and he had 
power to utter sounds, which should be to himself the names 
of things, according as he might think fit to call them. These 
he might teach Eve, and in time both of them teach their 
children ; and thus began and spread the first language of the 
world. Perhaps in this, as in many other disputes, the truth 
may lie between the extremes. If our first parents had no 
extraordinary divine assistance in forming a language, it must 
have been a considerable time before they would have been 

* Abarbanel in Gen. ii. 19. See Buxtorf, ubi supra, sect. xxii. p. 15, 16. 

f R. Jehudah in libro Cozri, et ejus commentator, R. Jehudah Muscatus. 
See Buxtorf, ubi supra, sect. xxi. p. 14, 15. 

I Etsi homines (inquit Heidegger. Hist. Patriarch, torn. i. exercit. xvi. 
sect. iii. p. 443, Amstel. 1667) potentiam habeant sibi mutuo animi sui 
notionem per verba ceu ayyeXovg quosdam vorjfxarojv expromendi, tamen 
ipsa verba non significant naturaliter, hoc est per connexionem aliquam na- 
turalem seu similitudinem verborum cum rebus ; sed inveniuntur ex pacto 
et placito, vel certe per institutionem et consuetudinem addiscuntur. 

§ Contra Eunom. lib. xii. See Heidegger. Histor. Patriarch, dissert, xvi. 
sect. v. — vii. torn. i. 

J| Shuckford's Connect, vol. i. book ii. p. 111. 



THE ORIGINAL LANGUAGE. 



555 



able to converse freely together ; which would have been a 
very great abatement of the pleasure of their paradisiacal 
state. Nevertheless, as, no doubt, God formed them with 
excellent abilities, it may reasonably be supposed he left them 
to exercise those abilities in perfecting a language upon the 
hints which he had given them.* 

But in whatever way the original language was formed, 

2dly. In the dispute, which was the original language, 
other nations have put in their claim with as much assurance 
as the Jews. The Armenians allege, that as the ark rested 
in their country, Noah and his children must have remained 
there a considerable time, before the lower and marshy coun- 
try of Chaldea could be fit to receive them ; and it is there- 
fore reasonable to suppose they left their language there, which 
was probably the very same that Adam spoke. 

Some have fancied the Greek the most ancient tongue, be- 
cause of its extent and copiousness. f 

The Teutonic, or that dialect of it which is spoken in the 
Lower Germany and Brabant, hath found a strenuous patron 
in Geropius Becanus,!: who endeavours to derive even the 
Hebrew itself from that tongue.. 

The pretensions of the Chinese to this honour have been 
allowed by several European s.§ The patrons of this opinion 
endeavour to support it, partly, by the great antiquity of the 
Chinese, and their having preserved themselves so many ages 
from any considerable mixture or intercourse with other na- 
tions. It is a notion advanced by Dr. Allix,|| and maintained 
by Mr. Whiston with his usual tenacity and fervour, that 
the Chinese are the posterity of Noah, by his children born 
after the flood ; and that Fohi, the first king of China, was 
Noah. 

It is farther alleged in favour of the Chinese language, 

* See Heidegger, ubi supra, sect. viii. is. 
f Eutych. Annales, p. 50. 

| See his Origines Antwerpise, lib. v. p. 539, et seq. 
§ See Webb's Essay toward discovering the Primitive Language. 
|| Reflections on the Books of the Holy Scripture, vol. i. part i. chap, xx, 
p. 112. 

1[ WhistoiLS Theory, book ii. p. 137, et seq.; and his Short View of the 
Chronology, &c. p. 61, et seq. See also Shuckford's Connexion, vol. i, 
book i. p. 29; book ii. p. 98 — 104. 



556 



THE ORIGINAL LANGUAGE. 



that, consisting of few words, and those chiefly monosyllables, 
and having no variety of declensions, conjugations, or gram- 
matical rules, it carries strong marks of being the first and 
original language. Shuckford saith, it is so like a first uncul- 
tivated essay, that it is hard to conceive any other tongue to 
have been prior to it; and whether it was itself the original 
language or not, in respect to its consisting of monosyllables, 
the first language was no doubt similar to it. For it cannot 
be conceived, if men had at first known that plenty of ex- 
pression which arises from polysyllables, any people or per- 
sons would have been so stupid as to reduce their language to 
words of one syllable only. # 

As for those which are called the oriental languages, they 
have each their partisans ; and of these the Hebrew and Sy- 
riac have the most votes. The generality of eastern writers 
allow the preference to the Syriac,+ except the Jews, who 
assert the antiquity of the Hebrew with the greatest warmth: 
and with them several Christian writers agree, particularly 
Chrysostom,t Austin,§ Origen,|| and Jerome,^! among the 
ancients; and among the moderns, Bochart,** Heidegger, ff 
Selden,lJ and Buxtorf.§§ The chief argument, to prove 
the Hebrew the original language, is taken from the names 
of persons mentioned before the confusion of Babel, which, 
they say, are plainly of the Hebrew derivation. As DTK 
Adam, from nDTN adamah, the ground, because God formed 
him out of the earth : iffl Eve, or Havah, from n>n hajah, 
vixit, because " she was the mother of all living:" |%p Cain, 
from n s p kajah, acquisivit: TW Seth, from HH0 suth, 

* Shuckford's Connex. vol. i. book ii. p. 123, 124. 
f Theodoret. Quaest. li. in Gen. 

I Chrysostorn. Homil. xxx. in Gen. xi. torn ii. p. 239. 
§ Augustin. de Civitat. Dei, lib. xvi. cap. xi. xii. 
|| Origen. Homil. xi. in Numb, xviii. 
% Hieron. in Soph. cap. iii. sect, xviii. 

** Bocharti Phaleg, sive Geograph. Sacr. lib. i. cap. xv. Oper. torn. i. 
p. 50, 51, edit. 1712. 

ft Heidegger, Histor. Patriarch, torn. i. exercitat. xvi. sect. xiv. et seq. 
torn. i. p. 455, et seq. Amstel. 1667. 

Selden. de Synedr. lib. ii. cap. ix. sect. iii. vol. i. torn. ii. p. 1420, 

1421. 

§§ Buxtorf. Dissertationes Philologico-Theolog. dissert, i. p. 21, et seq. 
Basil. 1662. 



THE ORIGINAL LANGUAGE. 



557 



posuit: J?D Peleg, from JT?D palag, divisit ; and several 
others. 

It is said these are plainly Hebrew names, and therefore, 
prove the Hebrew language to have been in use when they 
were given. Besides, it is alleged, the names of some nations 
are derived form Hebrew names. As Iwvia, Ionia, from 
Javan, the son of Japhet. And so likewise of some hea- 
then gods, as Vulcan, which seems to be a corruption of 
Tubal Cain; as Apollo does of Jubal. But Grotius* and 
others will not allow this argument to be conclusive, and 
therefore reply, 

1st. There are many more patriarchal names, of which we 
can find no such Hebrew derivation, than there are of which 
we can; and it might very likely happen, that among such a 
multitude of names, some few might answer to the word 
which expressed the sense of that original word from whence 
the name was derived, in whatever language Moses had 
written. Thus, supposing he had written in Latin, and ac- 
cordingly translated the name Adam into homo, it would have 
borne as near a relation to humus, the ground, as it does in 
the Hebrew to rtDlN adamah. 

2dly. We have no reason to conclude the names in the 
Mosaic history were the original names, and not translated by 
Moses into the language in which he wrote, since we have a 
plain instance of such a translation in his own name, which, 
as it was given him by Pharaoh's daughter, an Egyptian, can- 
not be supposed to have been originally Hebrew ; therefore, 
not ntt'D Mosheh, as he wrote it, but as it is in the Coptic 
version Mo'usi, from Mo'ti, which in that language signifies 
water, and si, taken. But Moses, finding the Hebrew word 
TWD mosheh, to " draw out," bearing some resemblance in 
sound to his name, and in signification to the occasion of it, 
translated the Egyptian name Mousi into the Hebrew Mosheh. 

3dly. It is said, that several of those names are more per- 
tinently derived from some other of the Oriental tongues 
than from the Hebrew: as Abel, or Hebel, which in He- 
brew signifies vanity or a vapour, seems not a name very ap- 
posite to Adam's second son; and, therefore, Moses hath as- 
signed no reason for his being called by that name. But if it 
* Grotius in Gen. xi. 1. 



THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES, 



be derived from the Syriac nn^ jehab eil, which signifies 
Dens dedit, it is very proper and expressive. So the name 
Babel, which the Hebrew text informs us was so called be- 
cause God did there bbz, balal, that is, confound the lano-ua^e 
of all the earth, may be more naturally derived from the Sy- 
riac, in which tongue Babel, or bobeel, signifies confusion. 
So that the Syriac, or perhaps any other of the eastern 
tongues, might be proved, by this argument from the etymo- 
logy of the names, to have been the original language, as 
well as the Hebrew. 

Le Clerc farther advances, that several of these names 
were not the proper names, by which the persons were called 
from their birth ; but cognomina, or sirnames, which were 
given them afterward on account of something remarkable 
in their lives, and which an historian would naturally have 
translated into his own language. Thus the Greek writers 
speak of Pelusia, a city of Egypt, which was so called 
airo rov ttt]\ov, from clay, because it stood in clayey ground ; 
yet it can hardly be supposed this was its proper Egyptian 
name. 

Upon the whole, Le Clerc's opinion seems to bid fairest 
for the truth, that neither the Hebrew, nor Syriac, nor Chal- 
dee, nor any other language now extant, was the true origi- 
nal tongue; but that this, and the other Oriental tongues, 
have all sprung from, or are so many different dialects of that 
first language, itself now lost among them. As the Italian, 
French, and Spanish, are none of them the language of the 
ancient Romans, but all derived from if.* 

Having failed in the attempt of tracing up the Hebrew lan- 
guage with any certainty to Adam, we are now to inquire to 
what people or nation it properly belonged after the confusion 
of Babel. 

Those who are zealous for the high antiquity of the He- 

* See on this subject Clerici Frolegom. i. in Pentateuch'; Grotius in 
Gen. xi. 1 ; Heutii Demonst. Evang. prop. iv. cap. xiii. sect. for. ; Buxtorf. 
Dissertat. de Antiquitate Ling. Hebr. sect, xxvii.; Heidegger. Histor. Pa- 
triarch, torn. i. exercit. vi. sect. x. — xviii. p. 451 — 465 ; Walton. Prolegom. 
iii. sect. iii. — xii.; Pfeiffer. Dissert, de Ling. Protoplast, ad calcem Dub. 
Vexat, and his Critica Sacra, cap. iii.; Bocharti Phaleg. lib. i. cap. xv. ; 
Vitring. Observationes, dissert, i. cap. i. — v.; Father Simon's Critical His- 
tory, book i. chap. xiv. xv. 



THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES. 



559 



brew tongue, tell us, it was preserved, in the midst of that 
confusion, in the family of Eber, who, they say, was not con- 
cerned in the building of Babel, and consequently did not 
share in the punishment inflicted on those that were. 

Before we examine this opinion, it may be no improper di- 
gression to consider briefly the account we have of that con- 
fusion, and of the origin of different languages, in the eleventh 
chapter of Genesis, where we read, that " the whole earth 
was of one language, and of one speech;" ver. 1. And 
again, ver. 6, 7, "The Lord said, Behold the people is one, 
and they have all one language." But God said, " Let us go 
down and confound their language, that they may not under- 
stand one another's speech." And again, "The Lord did 
there confound the language of all the earth ;" ver. 9. Now 
as to the degree of this confusion, and the manner in which 
it was effected, there is a great diversity of sentiments. 

The modern Jews, as Julius Scaliger informs us,* under- 
stand it not of a multiplication of tongues, but of a confusion 
of those ideas which they affix to words. Suppose, for in- 
stance, one man called for a stone, another understood him to 
mean mortar, having that idea now fixed to the word ; another 
understood water, and another sand. But though such a dif- 
ferent connecting of ideas with the same words must needs 
produce a strange confusion among the people, enough to 
make them desist from their undertaking, nevertheless this by 
no means accounts for the diversity of tongues, which con- 
sists not in the same words being used in different senses, but 
in the use of words quite remote and different from one 
another. 

Others are of opinion, that all the confusion which hap- 
pened at Babel, was in the people's quarrelling among them- 
selves, and thereupon bandying into parties, and separating 
from each other ; which, they say, is ascribed to God in the 
same sense in which it is elsewhere said, there " is no evil in 
the city, and the Lord hath not done it that is, permitted 
and overruled it to the accomplishment of his own wise and 
gracious designs. 

As for the different languages now in the world, these 

* Scalig. Exercitat. in Cardan. 259, sect. i. cited by Stillingfleet, Origen. 
Sacr. book iii. chap. v. sect. iii. p. 362, 8th edit, 1709. 



.560 



THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES. 



gentlemen suppose, that they all arose at first from one 
original language, and that this variety is no more than must 
naturally have happened in so long a course of time, partly 
through the difference of climates, which, it is said, will occa- 
sion a difference of pronunciation, and thereby gradually a 
variation in languages ; and from various other causes, which 
are sometimes observed to have so altered the language of 
some nations, that it hath hardly been intelligible at the dis- 
tance of two or three hundred years. Thus the Salian verses, 
composed by Numa, were scarcely understood by the priests 
in Quinctilian's time.* " Saliorum Carmina," saith he, " vix 
sacerdotibus suis satis intellecta." And we find it no less 
difficult to understand the language of our forefathers three or 
four centuries ago. 

To this hypothesis, that what is commonly called the con- 
fusion of tongues was only a difference of opinions, and the 
contentions consequent thereupon, it may be objected, that 
this does by no means come up to the obvious meaning of the 
sacred history, which tells us, " that God did there," even at 
Babel, " confound the language of all the earth ;" which be- 
fore was " one" and the same; implying, that in consequence 
of this extraordinary procedure of Providence, there was now 
a diversity of tongue, which occasioned their " not under- 
standing one another's speech :" and likewise, that several of 
the present languages are so entirely remote from one another, 
that with no reasonable probability can they be supposed to 
have sprung from the same original. For though length of 
time may very much alter a language in its words and phrases, 
according to the observation of Horace,f 

Multa renascentur, quce jam cecidere ; cadentque, 
Quae nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus : 

yet what instance can be produced of mere length of time 
bringing a whole language out of use, and introducing another 
in the room of it. Besides, the greatest alterations of lan- 
guages, of which any history since that of Babel informs us, 
have arisen from the intermixture of people of different lan- 
guages. Thus the Roman language was corrupted and altered 

* Quinctil. Institut. Orat. lib. i. cap. vi. p. 45, edit. Gibson, Oxon. 1693, 
f De Arte Poetica, 1. 70. 



THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES. 



561 



by the multitude of foreign slaves which were kept at Rome. 
But if all languages had originally sprung from one, such an 
intermixture of the people of different nations must have 
tended to prevent the diversity of language instead of pro- 
moting: it. 

Dr. Shuckford has an hypothesis, I suppose, peculiar to 
himself ; that the builders of Babel were evidently projectors, 
and their heads being full of innovations, some of the leading- 
men among them set themselves to invent new words, as par- 
ticularly polysyllables, and to spread them among their com- 
panions, from whence in time a different speech grew up in 
one party from that in another, till at length it came to such 
a height, as to cause them to form different companies, and 
so to separate.* 

It maybe objected to this hypothesis, as well as to the for- 
mer, that it by no means comes up to the obvious meaning of 
the sacred history. Besides, Theseus Ambrose f hath started 
another material objection, that the diversity of languages 
cannot be supposed to have arisen from choice and contriv- 
ance, unless it can be imagined that men would do themselves 
such a prejudice as that, when they had one common language 
to represent their conception, they should themselves intro- 
duce so great an alteration, as would break off that mutual 
society and converse which even nature itself dictated. 

As to what Dr. Shuckford saith, that experience shows the 
fear of doing mischief hath not restrained the projects of am- 
bitious men, it may be replied, that though it may not have 
restrained them from doing it to others, it surely will restrain 
them from doing it to themselves. And as to what he farther 
alleges, that he sees no detriment arising from the confusion 
of languages, let experience, and the immense pains men are 
forced to take in learning foreign languages, which they have 
occasion for, tell us, whether it be an inconvenience and de- 
triment, or not. 

Upon the whole, I can see no reason to depart from the 
obvious meaning of the historical narrative, which represents 
the confusion of tongues as the immediate act of God, but 

* Shuckford's Connect, vol. i. book ii. p. 133. 

f Theseus Ambros. de Causis Mutationis Linguarum. 

2 o 



562 



THE CQNFUSION OF LANGUAGES. 



think it right to conclude with Calvin, " Prodigii loco haben- 
da est linguarum diversitas." # 

It would be to little purpose to inquire, in what way and 
manner these new languages were formed ; for though there 
are various, they are all uncertain conjectures about it.f 

There is one inquiry more on this head, on which we shall 
briefly touch ; namely, how many languages arose from the 
confusion of Babel. 

The Jews make them seventy, imagining there were seventy 
different nations then planted in the world, J a notion which 
they ground on the following passage in Deuteronomy : 
"When the Most High divided to the nations their inhe- 
ritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the 
bounds of the people according to the number of the children 
of Israel;" chap, xxxii. 8. That is, say they, he divided 
them into seventy nations, seventy being the number of the 
children of Israel when they came into Egypt. § Bochart, 
however, hath given a far more probable sense of this pas- 
sage, that God so distributed the earth among the several 
people that were therein, as to reserve, or in his sovereign 
counsel to appoint, such a part for the Israelites, though they 
were then unborn, as might prove a commodious settlement 
and habitation for them.|| 

We have no way to determine how many languages sprung- 
out of the first confusion. No doubt but their number hath 
been since multiplied ; for we have instances in later ages of 
several languages growing out of one j the Italian, French, and 
Spanish, for instance, out of the Latin. And thus, probably, 
several eastern tongues, or dialects, arose out of one ; but 

* Calvin. Annot. in Gen. xi. 1, 2. 

f See Buxtorf. Dissert, de Ling. Hebr. Confusione, et Plurimum Linguar. 
Origine ; Vitring. Observat. dissert, i.; Stillingfleet's Origines Sacrae, book iii. 
chap. v. sect, iv.; Dr. Wotton's Discourse concerning the Confusion of Lan- 
guages ; and Dr. Brett's Essay on the same subject. 

I Targum Jonathan in Gen. xi. 7, 8. 

§ Targum Jonathan in Deut. xxxii. 8, and R. Bechai, quoted by Buxtorf, 
apud Dissertationes Philologico-Theolog. dissert, ii. de Ling. Hebr. Confus. 
sect, xliii. p. 79, where, and in the following pages, are many other testi- 
monies to the same purpose. 

|| Bocharti Geograph. Sacra, lib. i. cap. xv. Oper. torn. i. p. 57, edit. 
1712. 



THE CONFUSION OF LANGUAGES. 



563 



whether out of the antediluvian language, or some other, is by 
no means certain. 

We now return to the inquiry, To what people, after the 
dispersion of the nations, the Hebrew language originally be- 
longed. The opinion of the Jews hath been already men- 
tioned that it was the language of Heber's family, from which 
Abraham sprung. But this is gratis dictum, or rather highly 
improbable, since we find Heber's family, in the fourth gene- 
ration after the dispersion, living in Chaldea, where Abraham 
was born, Gen. xi. 27, 28 ; and there is no reason to think 
they used a different language from their neighbours around 
them. Now, that the Chaldee, and not the Hebrew, was the 
language of Abraham's country, and of his kindred, appears 
in that he sent his servant to his own country, and to his 
kindred, to take a wife for his son Isaac, namely, Rebekah, 
Gen. xxiv. 4; and that Laban, the brother of Rebekah, spake 
a different language from the Hebrew, namely, the Chaldee ; 
for the same pillar, or heap of stones, which Jacob called 
lybl galgnedh, which is a Hebrew word, Laban calls in his 
language Nnnrtitf ~\X>jegar sahadhutha, which is pure Chaldee; 
Gen. xxxi. 46, 47. From whence it seems reasonable to 
conclude, that Abraham's native language was Chaldee, and 
that the Hebrew was the language of the Canaanites, which 
Abraham and his posterity learnt by dwelling among them. 
This Le Clerc hath endeavoured to prove, # 

1st. From the names of places, as well as men, in the land 
of Canaan being pure Hebrew. Fuller, indeed, in his Mis- 
cellanies^ supposes, that Moses, in writing his history, trans- 
lated the Canaanitish names into Hebrew, which, if well 
grounded, would entirely destroy the argument which he him- 
self and others make use of to prove, that the Hebrew was 
the antediluvian language, from the names of some of the 
ancient patriarchs being pure Hebrew. But this does not 
seem to be the case as to the names of places in Canaan ; for 
we find, that though the Israelites changed the names of some 
of them, yet their old names were as much Hebrew as their 
new ones. For instance, Mamre, which they changed into 

* Vid. Clerici Prolegom. i. in Pentateuch, de Ling. Hebr. 
f Fuller. Miscell. lib. iv. cap. iv. apud Criticos Sacros, torn. ix. p. 
2398. 

2 O 2 



564 



EXCELLENCY OF 



Hebron, Gen. xiii. 18; Kirjath-sepher, which they changed 
into Debir, Josh. xv. 15; and Lashem, which they changed 
into Dan ; Josh. xix. 47. 

It is farther observed, that the names of the cities of the 
Philistines, who were a part of the Canaanites not subdued 
by the Israelites, were probably Hebrew, such as Gaza, 
Ashdod, Gath, Ekron, &c. 

2dly. Whereas the Egyptians, and other neighbouring na- 
tions, are called " a people of a strange language" to the 
Jews (Psalm cxiv. 1 ; lxxxi. 5), nothing like that is ever said 
of the Canaanites. 

3dly. If none but Jacob's family had spoken Hebrew, where 
could Joseph have found an interpreter between him and his 
brethren, when he affected not to understand Hebrew ? Gen. 
xlii. 23. Probably this interpreter was some Canaanite. 

4thly. The Hebrew language seems, to this author, to have 
been originally formed by Polytheists, and such as worshipped 
deified heroes, particularly from the plural name of God, Elo- 
him; and from those metaphorical descriptions of the Divine 
attributes, which are plainly borrowed from man, as the soul, 
the ears, the face, the eyes, the hands of God ; which meta- 
phors, he supposes, would never have been used, if the lan- 
guage had been originally formed by people who had no other 
notion of God but that of a pure spirit. It seems to have 
been originally the language of idolaters. 

5thly. He alleges the testimony of Bochart, who shows, 
from some remains of the Phoenician language, that it was 
originally Hebrew.* Thus the chief magistrates of the Car- 
thaginians, who were originally Phoenicians, or Canaanites, 
were called Suffites, which seems to be a corruption of the 
Hebrew word OWDW shophetim, judges. 

The most material objection I can find against this hypo- 
thesis is taken from the thirteenth chapter of Nehemiah, 
ver. 24, where it is said, that some Jews having married 
wives of Ashdod, " their children spoke half in the speech of 
Ashdod, and could not speak in the Jews' language." Now 
Ashdod was one of the cities of the Philistines, who were 
Canaanites; from whence, therefore, it should seem, that the 

* Bocharti Chanaan, sive Geograph. Sacr. pars posterior, lib. ii. per 
totum. 



THE HEBREW LANGUAGE. 



565 



Jews' language, namely, Hebrew, and that of the Canaanites, 
were not the same. But it may be answered, 

1st. That this was after the captivity, when the Jews had 
in a great measure lost the Hebrew. So that by the Jews' 
language we may here rather understand Chaldee than He- 
brew. 

2dly. That the speech of Ashdod, perhaps, might differ from 
that of the Jews only in pronunciation and dialect; as the 
Ephraimites, Judges xii. 6, pronounced differently from the 
other tribes, while yet they all spoke Hebrew.* 

Having thus endeavoured to trace the antiquity of the 
Hebrew language, we now come to consider the language 
itself. 

It being common for people to find out peculiar excellencies 
in their own language, the Hebrews have done so in theirs ; 
and many Christians have joined with them in bestowing high 
encomiums upon it, as superior to all others. But whether 
that be owing to its real intrinsic excellencies, or to its advo- 
cates being prejudiced in its favour, on account of so many 
of the sacred books being written in it, we do not pretend to 
determine. 

This language is said to abound in the aptest etymologies 
and roots of the names both of men and things ; that in it the 
names of brutes express their nature and properties more sig- 
nificantly and accurately than in any other known language in 
the world ; that its words are concise, yet expressive ; derived 
from a small number of roots, yet without the studied and 
artificial composition of the Greek and Roman languages; 
that its words follow each other in an easy and natural order, 
without intricacy or transposition; and above all, that it hath 
the happiest and richest fecundity in its verbs, of any known 
tongue, either ancient or modern; which urises from the 
variety and sufficiency of its conjugations ; by means of which, 
as Bellarmine observes in his Hebrew Grammar, all the variety 
of significations into which it is possible for a verb to be 
branched out, are expressed with a very small variation either 
of 1 the points, or of a letter or two, which in any other lan- 

* For proof that the Hebrew was the language of the Canaanites, see 
also Joseph Scaliger, Epist. ccxlii. et ccclxii.; Walton. Prolegom. ii. sect, 
xiii. — xix.; Selden, cap. ii. Prolegom. de Diis Syris. 



566 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



guage cannot be done without circumlocution. In a word, 
this language is said to be so concise, yet significant ; so pa- 
thetic, yet free from lightness, or bombast, as of all others to 
approach nearest to the language of spirits, who need no 
words to convey their ideas to each other. 

But whether this language deserves these high encomiums, 
in preference to all others, or not, yet as God hath thought fit 
to convey to us so great a part of his revelations thereby, it 
certainly concerns us to be well acquainted with it. But it is 
not my present business to teach it; nor do you need instruc- 
tion from me on this head. 

All I shall farther offer, with respect to the language itself, 
will regard the letters in which it is written. 

Concerning these there are two controversies, one about the 
consonants, the other about the vowels, or points. 

First, Concerning the consonants. It is disputed, whether 
the sacred books were originally written in the present He- 
brew square character, otherwise called the Assyrian or Chal- 
dee character, or in the old Samaritan. Each side of this 
question is warmly maintained by different critics, though the 
latter opinion is now more generally received. 

Joseph Scaliger, in his notes upon Eusebius's Chronicon,* 
thinks it so evident that the sacred books were originally 
written in the Samaritan character, at least those of them 
written before the captivity, that he saith it is luce clarius ; 
and, with the usual politeness of a great critic, calls those of 
the contrary opinion semi-docti, semi-tkeologi , semi-homines, 
and asini. 

He, with others on this side of the question, conceives the 
Samaritan was the ancient Phoenician character, and con- 
stantly used by the Jews till the Babylonian captivity, when, 
learning the Chaldee character from the Babylonians, they 
preferred it to their own on account of its far superior beauty. 
So that by the time they returned from the captivity, they had 
in a manner quite disused their ancient character ; for which 
reason Ezra found it requisite to have the sacred books tran- 
scribed into the Chaldee square character, and from that time 
the old character hath been retained only by the Samaritans. 

* Scalig. Animadversiones in Eiiseb. Chronic, sub anno 1617, p. 111 = 
See also his Epist. ccxlii. et ccclxii. 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



567 



But there are others who strenuously contend for the an- 
tiquity of the present Hebrew letters, as if they, and no others, 
were the sacred character in which the holy Scriptures were 
originally, and have always been, written; and that the Sama- 
ritan was never used for that purpose, except among the Sa- 
maritans, who, in opposition, they say, to the Jews, wrote the 
law of Moses, which is said to be the only part of Scripture 
they received, in this character, different from that which was 
used by the Jews. Some of the talmudists,* indeed, are 
quoted by Father Morin, Bishop Walton ,t and others, as 
having declared for the contrary side. Nevertheless, other 
talmudical writers maintain the antiquity of the present cha- 
racter. X And there is a remarkable passage in the tract Me- 
gillah, wherein, on occasion of its having been said by Moses, 
that the tables of the law were written on both their sides, 
ntoi ntft mizzeh umizzeh, on one side and on the other, 
Exod. xxxii. 15, we are informed, that the letters were cut 
through and through, so as to be seen and read on both sides. 
And when it is asked, how it was possible for the middle of 
the D samech and D mem clausum, or final mem, to support it- 
self, the answer is, it was suspended by a miraculous power. § 
Certainly those talmudical rabbies, who have advanced this 
story, did not at all dream of the Samaritan being the ancient 
Hebrew character ; for the Samaritan samech and mem are 
of a quite different shape from the present Hebrew, and 
would have stood in need of no such miracle to support the 
middle of them. Not to add, that the Samaritans make no 
difference between the final, or the medial and initial letters. || 

Buxtorf^f endeavours to reconcile these two opinions, by 
producing a variety of passages from the rabbies** to prove, 

* Vid. Cocceii Excerpt. Gemar. Cod. Sanhedr. cap. ii. sect. xiii. p. 186. 
f Walton. Polyglot. Prolegom. iii. sect, xxxii. xxxiii. p. 21. 
% Vid. Excerpt. Gemar. ubi supra, p. 186, 187. 

§ Talm. Babylon. Cod. Megillah, cap. i. et de Sabbatho, fol. 104, col. i. 
See Buxtorf, Dissert. Philologico-Theolog. diss. iv. sect. xvi. p. 174, 175. 

|| Universal History, book i. chap. vii. concerning the language, writing, 
and learning of the Jews, note (v.) 

51 Buxtorf, Dissertat. Philolog. Theolog. dissert, iv. de Literar. Hebraic, 
genuina antiquitate, sect. xiv. xv. xvii. xviii. xx. xlii. — xliv. 

In particular Mairaon. et Bartenor in Mishn. tit. Jadaim, cap. ult. 
sect. v. torn. vi. p. 490. 



568 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



that both these characters were anciently used ; the present 
square character being that in which the tables of the law, and 
the copy deposited in the ark, were written ; and the other 
character being used in the copies of the law which were 
written for private and common use, and in civil affairs in ge- 
neral; and that after the captivity Ezra enjoined the former 
to be used by the Jews on all occasions, leaving the latter to 
the Samaritans and to apostates. And whereas the talmudical 
rabbies style the Hebrew square characters nmttfN ashurith, 
scriptura Assyriaca, this is said not to be a proper name, 
denoting the country where this character was used, and from 
whence it was borrowed, but to be nomen appellativum, de- 
rived from ashar, beatum reddere, and to signify, there- 
fore, beata Scriptura, the blessed Scripture. R. Gedaliah, 
indeed, supposes it was called the Assyrian character, because 
it was appropriated to sacred, and never employed for com- 
mon purposes, before the captivity in Babylon, from whence 
it was brought by the elders, who alone had the knowledge of 
it by tradition.* However, a bare inspection of the two cha- 
racters renders the supposition, that both of them should ever 
have been used at the same time, somewhat improbable ; for 
whereas the Chaldee is one of the most beautiful, the Sama- 
ritan, on the contrary, is one of the most uncouth, unsightly, 
and puzzling characters that ever was invented ; and it can 
hardly, therefore, be imagined, that if the Jews had been ac- 
quainted with one so much superior as the Chaldee, they 
would ever have used the other, unless out of a superstitious 
regard to it as sacred, and as deeming it a profanation to use 
it in common and civil concerns. But it can scarcely be be- 
lieved, that such an idle and superstitious opinion prevailed 
among them in the times of Moses and the prophets. 

The chief arguments, on both sides of this question, are as 
follow : — 

First. Those who argue in favour of the present square 
character being the original, allege, 

1st. The following passage of St. Matthew : ? One jot or 
tittle shall not pass from the law till all be fulfilled chap. v. 
18. From hence it should seem, that Iota, or Jod, was the 
least of the consonants, as indeed it is in the present Hebrew, 
* Buxtorf. ubi supra, sect. xliv. p. 203. 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



569 



but in the Samaritan it is one of the largest letters. Schick- 
ard calls this argumentum Palmarium.* But Bishop Wal- 
ton replies, that, supposing Christ speaks here of the least 
letter of the alphabet, which, however, he does not admit, 
all that can be fairly inferred from it is, that the present 
Chaldee character was used in our Saviour's time, which is 
not denied by those who maintain the Samaritan to be the 
original .f 

2dly. They allege the following passage of Isaiah : " Of 
the increase/' HIID^ lemarbth, " of his government and peace 
there shall be no end," &c, chap. ix. 7; where the word 
rQ")D^> lemarbth hath a mem clausum in the middle of it, of 
which there are only two instances. It is imagined this con- 
tains a mystery, and signifies, that Christ should come ex 
utero clauso. But this mystery cannot be expressed in the 
Samaritan character, it having no mem clausum. The pro- 
phecy of Isaiah, therefore, it is said, was originally written in 
the present character. It is answered, that it is only gratis 
dictum there is any mystery in this letter; and the easiest 
way of accounting for it is by the carelessness of some tran- 
scriber.;]; 

3dly. They argue from the temper of the Jews, who, being 
an obstinate and superstitious people, would never have 
suffered their sacred character to be altered. But this is more 
than can be proved, especially if it was done by the direction 
of Ezra. 

4thly. They say, that Ezra could not do this if he would, 
nor would he if he could. He could not do it, because it was 
impossible to make this alteration in all their copies. But it 
may be asserted as well, that the old English black letter, in 
which Bibles were formerly written and printed, could not be 
changed for the Roman, which we know is now universally 
used. It is farther said, that Ezra would not do it, had it 
been practicable ; for since he blamed those that spake the 
language of Ashdod, Nehem. xiii. 23, he would not surely 
profane the sacred writings with a heathen character. But 
this argument supposes some sanctity in the shape of the let- 

* Vid. Schickard, in Bechinath Happerushim, disp. v. p. 82, 83. 
f Walton, ubi supra, sect, xxxvi. p. 23. 
X Walton, ubi supra. 



570 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



ters, which we can hardly imagine Ezra was so superstitious 
as to believe. 

5thly. They argue from ancient coins found in Judea, with 
Solomon's head on the face, and the temple on the reverse, 
with a legend in the Chaldee or Assyrian character. But these 
medals were probably made by some knavish Christians, in 
order to get money by imposing on the pilgrims to the Holy 
Land. 

The same may be said of some Hebrew inscriptions in the 
present character, upon the sepulchres of the patriarchs, 
Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Rachel, and Leah, which R. Benja- 
min saith he saw in the year 1170.* 

The arguments on the other side, for the Samaritan cha- 
racter being the original, are, 

1st. From the account in the Second Book of Kings, 
chap. xvii. 28, that when the ten tribes were carried captive, 
and the Samaritans put in their room, they were annoyed with 
lions, upon which a Jewish priest was sent to teach them the 
manner of the God of the land, or the worship of Jehovah ; 
in order to which he must certainly teach them the law ; but 
we have no account of his teaching them the language or cha- 
racter; from whence it is presumed the law was then written 
in the character which the Samaritans used. 

2dly. It is argued in favour of the Samaritan character 
from the authority of Jerome, who observeth, on occasion of the 
prophet Ezekiel's being ordered " to set a mark," in the He- 
brew in tau, " upon the forehead of the men that sigh and 
cry for the abominations done in the midst of Jerusalem," 
chap. ix. 4 ; that this mark was the sign of the cross, there 
being a resemblance of that figure in the tau of the ancient 
alphabet, which, saith he, is what the Samaritans now use. 
If so, the form of this letter must have been, as some assert it 
was, different in his time from what it is at present, in which 
the resemblance is very smalLf 

* Walton, ubi supra, sect. xxx'v. p. 22. See Conringii Paradoxa de 
Nummis Hebraeoram, cap. v.-— vii. et.xi. apud Crenii Fascicul. Secundum. 

f Hieron. in loc. Antiquis, inquit, Hebraeorum Uteris, quibus usque ho- 
die utuntur Samaritani, extrema litera Thau crucis habet similitudinem. 
See Dr. Kennicott's second Dissertation on the state of the Hebrew Text, 
p. 49, 50, and Hieron. Alexandri. Epist. Jo, Morino, apud Antiquitates 



HEBREW CHARACTER. 



571 



3dly. The chief argument is taken from the old Jewish 
shekel, which on one side hath the pot of manna, and on the 
other, Aaron's miraculous rod that budded ; with a legend on 
one side, u The shekel of Israel;" on the other, " Jerusalem 
the holy," both in Samaritan characters. Some of the shekels 
were in the possession of Rabbi Moses Nachmanides, and 
Rabbi Azarias,* among the Jews; and of Montanus,f and 
Villalpandus,J and others among the Christians. 

Now this shekel could not belong to the Samaritans after 
the captivity, whose hatred to the Jews would never have 
suffered them to strike such an inscription on their coin, as 
" Jerusalem hackodesh." It must, therefore, have belonged 
to the Jews before the captivity, which consequently proves 
the Samaritan character to have been then in use. This 
argument seems, indeed, to be demonstration. Nevertheless, 
considering the many notorious impositions with respect to 
coins and medals, we should be well assured of the genuine- 
ness of these shekels,^ before we are absolutely determined 
by them. || 

Ecclesiae Orientalis clar. virorum Card. Barbarini, &c. Dissertationibus 
Epistolicis enucleatus, epist. vi. p. 144, 145, Londini, 1682. 

* Menor. Enaim, p. 171. See. the passage apud Ezec. Spanheim. de 
usu et praestant. Numism. dissert, iv. p. 334, edit. Amstel. 1671 ; or in 
Hottinger de Nummis Oriental, dissert, iii. ad calcem Cippor. Hebr. p. 
133—139, 2d edit. Heidelberg, 1662. 

f Ariae Montani Tubal-Cain, de Siclo, vol. iii. ab init. apud Criticos Sa- 
cros, torn. viii. p. 657, edit. Londini. 

X Villalpandi Apparatus in Ezekielem. 

§ Hottinger maintains the genuineness and great antiquity of these shekels, 
supposing at the same time that the Samaritan character was used only for 
civil and profane purposes, and not for writing the holy Scriptures. See his 
Crippi Hebr. dissert, iii. de Nummis Orientalibus. On the other hand, 
Conringius, in his Paradoxa de Nummis Hebreeorum, cap. viii. ix., endeavours 
to prove they were struck after the captivity, in the times of the Asmonean 
princes, and of the Herods. See also Reland de Nummis Samaritanis, dis- 
sert, i. 

|| See, concerning the Hebrew letters, Ludov. Capell. de Antiq. Literar. 
Hebraic; Morini exercitat. in Pentateuch. Samarit. exerc. ii. cap. iii. sect, 
iv. et seq. ; Father Simon's Critical History of the Old Testament, book i. 
chap, xiii.; PfeifFeri Critica Sacra, cap. iv. sect, ii.; Leusden. Philolog. 
Hebraus; Prideaux's Connect, part. i. book vi. sub A, 446; and Scaliger, 
and Buxtorf, and Walton, as before quoted. 



572 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



We proceed, now, 

Secondly, To consider the points or vowels, concerning 
which there is likewise no little controversy, whether they are 
of the same antiquity and authority with the consonants, or of 
a later original. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, 
the famous Elias Levita, a German Jew, ventured to call 
their antiquity in question, and ascribed the invention of them 
to the Masorites of the school of Tiberias, about five hundred 
years after Christ. The book which he published on this 
subject, soon raised him a cloud of adversaries, both of his 
own nation and among Christians. Of the latter were prin- 
cipally the two Buxtorfs; the father, in his book called " Ti- 
berias, sive Commentarius Masoreticus and the son, in his 
" Tractatus de Punctorum, Vocalium, et Accentuum, inlibris 
Veteris Testamenti Hebraicis, Origine, Antiquitate et Autho- 
ritate;"* which he wrote in answer to Ludovicus Capel, a 
Protestant divine, and Hebrew professor at Saumur, who in 
his " Arcanum Punctationis" had espoused Levita's opinion ; 
as did likewise Joseph Scaliger,f Morinus,J Drusius,§ and 
several other critics. 

This controversy hath employed the learned for upwards of 
two hundred years. 

I shall first give an account of the several hypotheses which 
have been advanced on this subject, and then of the argu- 
ments pro and con. 

The hypotheses are, 

]st. That the points are coeval with the consonants, and 
were written along with them in the original copies of the 
sacred law. 

The second is, that they were added by Ezra, at the time 
when he is supposed to have changed the old Samaritan for 
the Assyrian or Chaldee character. 

The third is, that they were invented and added by the 
Masorites of the school of Tiberias, certain Jewish gram- 

* See Buxtorf. de Antiquitate Punctor. part. ii. cap. xi. • 
f Scaliger, Epist. ad Buxtorf. 243. 

X Morin. Exercitat. Biblicae, exercit. vi. et Epist. Buxtorfio apud Anti- 
quitates Ecclesise Orientalis, &c; Dissertationibus Epistolicis enucleatus, 
epist. lxx. praesertim, p. 368, ad finem. 

§ Drusius ad Loca Difficil. Pentateuch, cap. 25. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



573 



marians, who devoted themselves to the revisal of the Hebrew 
text, and, in order to prevent any future alterations, numbered 
the sections, words, and letters, in each book. 

The school of Tiberias in Galilee was a very famous one, 
and flourished long after the destruction of the second temple. 
The grammarians, or critics, of that school, commonly called 
Masorites, are supposed to have invented the points after the 
completion of the Talmud. The Papists generally embrace 
this hypothesis, because, in their opinion, it serves the cause 
of oral tradition, and hath a tendency to weaken the authority 
and sufficiency of the sacred text; and for other reasons 
several Protestants have received it. As for Capel, the most 
celebrated Christian champion for this hypothesis, although he 
agrees with Elias Levita in ascribing the first edition of the 
points in the text to the Masorites of Tiberias, he nevertheless 
differs from him in this, that he makes the invention of them 
to be purely human, and so represents them as of no autho- 
rity ; whereas Levita supposes the points expressed the true 
and genuine reading, which had been preserved and handed 
down by tradition from the first writers of the sacred books; 
so that in effect they are of equal authority with the conso- 
nants. 

There is yet a fourth hypothesis of Dr. Prideaux, who goes 
a middle way between those who contend for the points being 
coeval with the consonants, or at least for their being added 
by Ezra under divine inspiration, and those who allow them 
no higher original than the school of Tiberias. He con- 
ceives they were added by more ancient Masorites, soon after 
Ezra, when the Hebrew ceased to be a living language ; but 
did not come into common use, nor were taught in the divinity 
schools, till after the compiling of the Talmud. There were 
anciently two sorts of schools among the Jews, the schools of 
the Masorites, and the schools of the Rabbies. The former 
only taught the Hebrew language, and the reading of the Scip- 
tures in it; the latter, the understanding of the Scriptures, and 
the traditional interpretation of them. Now the vowel points, 
Dr. Prideaux supposes, were in use in the schools of the 
Masorites several ages before they were introduced into the 
schools of the Rabbies; and thus he accounts for their not 



574 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



being mentioned in the Talmud, nor by the ancient Christian 
fathers before the time of the Masorites of Tiberias. # 

We now proceed to consider the arguments for and against 
these different hypotheses. 

First. For the antiquity and divine authority of the points, 
whether coeval with the consonants, or added by Ezra. 

To prove that they were not invented by the Masorites of 
Tiberias, it is alleged, 

1st. That there is no mention in any Jewish writer, of such 
an alteration being made in the Hebrew Bible ; which doubt- 
less there would have been, had it been fact.f 

2dly. That all the annotations or notes of the Masorites, 
upon the vowels, relate to the irregularity of them. For in- 
stance, in their commentaries on the nineteenth chapter of 
Genesis and the second verse, they observe, on the word 
rOT h'mne, ecce, which ought regularly to have been J13n 
hinnii, that every T\1T\ hinne in this sense is with kamctz 
parvum (by which they mean the vowel which we call tzeri), 
except only in this place. And in the sixteenth chapter of 
Genesis, there being in the thirteenth verse Ottf shhn, which 
in the fifteenth verse is W shem, they remark, that every Dttf 
shem, is with a kametz parvum, except six. Now had the 
Masorites been the inventors of the points, it is not to be 
thought they would have made them irregular according to 
their own judgments ; consequently they must have had these 
irregular points in the copies that were before them.i But 
it is observed, that though we should suppose the Masorites 
of Tiberias invented the points, yet others, perhaps several 
ages afterward, might make critical remarks upon them: 
for the Masorah, as printed in our present Bibles, saith Dr. 
Prideaux, is a collection and abridgment of the chief criti- 
cisms made on the Hebrew text from the beginning. § 

* Prideaux's Connect, part i. book v. vol i. p. 5 — 520, 10th edit, 
f Pfeifferi Critica Sacra, cap. iv. sect. ii. quaest. ii. p. 83, 84, Lipsiae, 
1712. 

% Buxtorf. Tiberias, cap. ix. p. 47, et seq. edit. Basil. 1665; et Buxtorf. 
Fil. de Punctomm Antiquitate, part. ii. cap. vi. p. 338, et seq. 

§- Capelli Arcanum Punctationis, lib. ii. cap. x. xi.; Prideaux's Connect, 
part. i. book v. vol. ii. p. 504, 10th edit. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



575 



3dly. There is express mention of the points or vowels in 
books more ancient than the Talmud ; namely, Bahir and 
Zohar : the first of which is said to have been written a little 
before our Saviour's time ; and the second, which quotes and 
refers to it, not much above a century after. # Buxtorf the 
elder quotes the following passage, among others, out of 
Bahir : "Talia sunt puncta cum Uteris legis Mosis qualis est 
anima vitas in corpore." But these two books are rejected 
by Capelf and others, as spurious and modern. Prideaux 
saith, there are many particulars in them, which manifestly 
prove them to be so, and that, for above a thousand years 
after the pretended time of their composure, they were never 
heard of, quoted, or mentioned .J 

4thly. That the points were in use in our Saviour's time, 
and therefore long before the Masorites of Tiberias, is argued 
from the following passage of St. Matthew : " One iota, or 
Kepaia," which we translate tittle, " shall not pass from the 
law chap. v. 18. The tittles, or points, therefore at that 
time belonged to the law.§ But Capel understands by the 
Ktpaiai, not the points, but the corolla, or nourishes, some- 
times made about the Hebrew consonants. || 

For the high antiquity of the points, and that they must 
be coeval with the consonants, it is argued, 

1st. That as it is impossible to pronounce the language 
without vowels, so it would be alike impossible to teach it, 
unless the vowels were expressed.^ And, 

2dly. If it be allowed, that the present vowel points are 
not of the same authority with the consonants, but merely of 
human and late invention, it will greatly weaken the authority 
of the holy Scriptures, and leave the sacred text to an arbi- 
trary and uncertain reading and interpretation. ## 

* Buxtorf. Tiberias, cap. ix. sect. iii. p. 70; Buxtorf. Fil. de Antiq. Punc- 
torum, part i. cap. v. p. 68, et seq. 

f Capell. Arcanum Punctat. lib. ii. cap. iii.; et Vindiciee Arcani ? lib. i. 
cap. viii. sect. xiii. et seq. 

X Prideaux's Connect, part i. book v. vol. ii. p. 501, 502, 10th edit, 

§ Buxtorf. Fil. de Punctorum Antiquitate, part ii. cap. xv. p. 435, 436. 

j| Capelli, Arcanum Punctationis, lib. ii. cap. xiv.; and Vindicise Arcani, 
lib. ii. cap. xiii.; see also Marckii Sylloge Dissertationum, exercitat. iii. 

1F See Buxtorf. de Punctor. Antiq. part. ii. cap. i. p. 305, et seq. 

** Buxtorf. Tiberias, cap. ix, p. 86 ; et Buxtorf- Fit de Punctor. Antiq . 



576 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



It is indeed advanced by the gentlemen on the other side 
of the question, that the aleph, he, vau,jod, and gnain, origi- 
nally served for vowels. # To which it is replied, that there 
are multitudes of words, in which none of these letters occur .f 
And it is certain they were not in all words in Jerome's time, 
who in his commentary on Isaiah saith, that the word -Q-f 
dhabhar, is written with three letters .J But Capel thinks 
it reasonable to suppose, that neither Moses nor Ezra would 
have used the aleph, vau, andjod at all, if they had been the 
authors of the points, which render these letters needless. 
And though all words have not these matres lectionis, yet 
wherever they are wanting, they may easily be supplied in 
reading, by those who are skilled in the tongue, as the persons 
undoubtedly were to whom it was a native language. § To 
which some have added, that these letters have been struck 
out of many words, in which they were formerly written, as 
being of no use since the invention of vowel points. To this 
it can only be replied, If that were the case, many "iotas 
must have perished from the law." Besides, who would ven- 
ture to expunge these letters ? Not, surely, the Masorites ; 
who were so superstitiously scrupulous and exact, as to pre- 
serve even the irregularities of the letters ; and having counted 
and set down the number of the letters contained in each book, 
they thereby placed a guard against its being done by any 
body after them. But notwithstanding all their care,|| it is 
certain the matres lectionis have been sometimes omitted ; for 
they are more frequent in some of the older manuscripts than 
in later manuscripts, or in the printed text. If 
part ii. cap. xiv. p. 419, et seq.; Carpzovii Critica Sacra, part i. cap. v. sect, 
vii. p. 243—248. 

* Capelli Arcanum Punctationis, lib. i. cap. xviii. xix. 

-j- Buxtorf. de Punctorum Antiq. part i. cap. xiv. p. 198; et part ii. 
cap. viii. 

X Hieron. in Isa. iii. 8. 

§ Capel. Vindiciae Arcani, lib. ii. cap. vi. 

|| Concerning the inconsistency and imperfection of the Masorah, and its 
insufficiency to guard the purity of the sacred text, see Capelli Critica Sacra, 
lib. v. cap. xii. p. 373, et seq.; lib. iii. cap. xvi. p. 156. 186; cap. xix. p. 
203 ; Dr. Kennicott's first Dissert, on the Hebrew Text, p. 247, 261, et seq., 
297, et seq., 348, 349. 546, 547; second Dissert, p. 245, et seq., 262—291. 
451. 468, 469 ; and in some other places. 

1f See Dr. Kennicott's first Dissert, on the Hebrew Text, p. 303. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



577 



The foregoing arguments for the antiquity of the points are 
produced, chiefly, by Buxtorf. We come now, 

Secondly, To consider the arguments against the antiquity 
of the points, by which Capel endeavours to prove, they were 
added by the Masorites of Tiberias. These are drawn from 
grammar, from testimony, and from history. 

1st. The grammatical arguments are built principally upon 
the keri and chethibh. The chethibh, from 2J"D chathabh, 
scripsit, is the reading in the text, the keri, from Nip kara, 
legit, the reading in the margin. Generally the wrong one is 
in the text, and the true in the margin. Some of the more 
modern rabbies ascribe these marginal corrections, or various 
readings, to Ezra. Abarbanel imputes the chethibhim, the 
irregularities and anomalies in the text, to the original writers, 
who designed to comprise some mysteries in them. Or, he 
thinks, they might, in some instances, be owing to their inad- 
vertency, or to their want of skill in grammar and orthogra- 
phy ; and that Ezra, not willing to insert in the text his cor- 
rections even of the mistakes of the original writers, contented 
himself with placing them in the margin. Elias Levita very 
absurdly maintains, that the various readings themselves were 
derived by tradition from the original writers.* The first of 
these opinions is the most plausible ; namely, that Ezra, in 
reviewing the different copies, in order to publish a perfect 
edition, marked the several variations, and put one reading in 
the text, and the other in the margin. But it is a strong ob- 
jection to Ezra's having done it, that such marginal readings, 
different from the text, are found in the book of Ezra itself, 
who cannot be supposed to have been in doubt of the true 
reading of his own writings ; and therefore they must, at least 
partly, have been inserted since Ezra's timet 

Further, it should seem that these marginal corrections were 
not in the copies from whence either the Seventy, the Chal- 
dee Paraphrast, Aquila, Symmachus, or Theodosian, made 
their versions ; since they sometimes follow the keri, some- 
times the chethibh; whereas had these marginal corrections 

* Capelli Critica Sacra, lib. iii. cap. xiv. 

f That the Kerioth were properly a collection of various readings, who- 
ever made the collection, is well proved by Dr. Kennicott, second Dissert, 
on the Hebrew Text, p. 281, et seq. 

2 p 



578 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



been in their copies, they would doubtless, ordinarily, if not 
always, have followed them. Neither Josephus, nor Philo, 
nor Origen, nor Jerome, make any mention of the keri and 
the chethibh; nor does the Mishnah. The Gemara, indeed, 
mentions those words which were written but not read, and 
those which were read but not written, as also obscene words, 
instead of which were read others that are more pure and 
chaste. But it does not take notice of the other part of the 
keri and chethibh, namely, those words which are written, 
and read in a different manner. From all this it is con- 
cluded, that the kerioth began to be collected a little before 
the completion of the Talmud, probably by the Masorites of 
Tiberias. # From hence Capel argues against the antiquity 
of the points, endeavouring to prove that they have no higher 
an original than the keri and the chethibh : and for this he 
offers the following reasons : — 

First. The kerioth are various lections of the consonants 
only ; there are none of the vowels or points, as doubtless 
there would have been, had the points been in the copies from 
whence the kerioth were made.f 

Secondly. There are certain irregularities in the punctua- 
tion, which show that the points were not in the copies from 
whence the keri and the chethibh were made. Now these 
irregularities are observed, both in whole words, and in parts 
of words. 

1st. In whole words ; these are either single words, or 
words combined, or divided. Those in single words are 
when the consonants are either redundant, or defective, or 
are wholly suppressed. Of the first sort, there is an instance 
in the fifty-first chapter of Jeremiah and the third verse ; 
where ■pT jidhroch is written twice. And this superfluous 
word hath no points : which is thus accounted for ; that those 
who settled the keri and chethibh, finding the word in their 
copies, durst not strike it out, but perceiving it to be an 
erratum, and superfluous, they would not point it : whereas, 
had it been pointed in their books, they would doubtless have 
given it as they found it, and no more have dared to expunge 
the vowels than the consonants. Hence it is inferred, that 

* Capell. Critica Sacra, lib. iii. cap. xiv. xv. 

f Capell. Arcanum Punctationis, lib. i. cap. vii. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



579 



the kerioth were more ancient than the points, and that the 
copies which supplied them were unpointed. 

Of the second sort, where the consonants are defective, we 
have an instance in the thirty-first chapter of Jeremiah, and the 
thirty-eighth verse ; where we have the vowels of a word in the 
chethibh, without the consonants, which consonants are sup- 
plied in the keri ; and without which supplement the text is 
not sense. The Masorah observes eleven instances of this kind. 
Now it cannot be thought the words were written thus origi- 
nally, or by Ezra, or that any other transcriber through care- 
lessness should omit the consonants, while he set down the 
vowels. Therefore it is supposed, that those who invented 
the points, found the word omitted, doubtless through the in- 
curia of some transcriber ; yet durst not put the consonants in 
the text, but in the margin, and the vowels only in the text. 

There are also instances of the consonants being suppressed 
in reading the text, by other consonants being put in their 
room in the margin ; as, when the original word seemed to those 
who invented the vowels to be obscene, and therefore not pro- 
per to be read, they have substituted another word in the mar- 
gin, and put the vowels proper to that word under the word 
in the text : for instance, in the eighteenth chapter of the 
Second Book of Kings, and the twenty-seventh verse; where 
the consonants in the text cannot be read with the vowels 
annexed to them, which evidently belong to the consonants in 
the margin. We cannot, therefore, suppose, that the vowels 
in the text were originally affixed to the words they are now 
under, or that they were put to those words before the inven- 
tion of these marginal readings. # 

There are observations likewise made on the combinations 
of words. Thus the word DDt^KD meeshtam, in the sixth 
chapter of Jeremiah and the twenty-ninth verse, ought to be 
written in two words, as in the margin ; for the punctuation 
is not just if the consonants are joined together; but agrees 
very well with the consonants if they are divided. 

Sometimes, again, we find one word broke into two in the 
text, which are joined together, as they should be, in the mar- 
gin. In the thirty-fourth chapter of the Second Book of 
Chronicles, and the sixth verse, DiTTQ ~\T12 bechar bothehem, 
* Capell. Arcanum Punctat. lib. i. cap. xi. especially sect. vi. — ix. 

2 p 2 



580 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



ought certainly to be one word, as in the margin ; otherwise 
the punctuation is very irregular. Now the books of Chro- 
nicles are generally supposed to have been written by Ezra. 
But whoever wrote them, it cannot be imagined, that this 
irregular punctuation was in the original copy; but the con- 
sonants happening to be afterwards divided through the in- 
curia of the transcriber, those who invented the points, fixed 
them as if it had been, what it ought to have been, one word . 
Thus much for the irregularities observed in whole words. # 

2dly. The irregularities which are observed in parts of 
words, or letters, are, 

1st. A pleonasm, when there are superfluous letters, either 
in the beginning, middle, or end of a word. In the beginning : 
as /Til for JYQ beth, 2 Kings xxii. 5; Jer. lii. 11 : for 
IKS tsea, chap. 1. 8. In the middle; as 2212 for 212 berobh, 
2 Kings xix. 23: DnWT) for DPT^m vehal/echem, 2 Sam. 
xvi. 2. In the end: as for Wit ish, 2 Sam. xxiii. 21 : 

l*yb and 1^2 for tyb langnai, and ^2 bangnai, Josh. viii. 
12: in all which places the superfluous letter hath no vowel 
to it; which shows, that the vowels were affixed to the text 
since these errors crept into it. 

2dly. An ellipsis, or the omission of a letter, either in the 
beginning of a word, as TVDV_ for HW jangnaseh, 1 Sam. 
xx. 2; where the vowel is in the text, under the place of the 
consonant which is omitted. So likewise lib for N^l velo, 
Lam. ii. 2: V$ for r*0 veein; chap. v. 7. Or in the middle 
of a word: as for Dll33nJl taccaphanchem, Jer. ii. 16: 

for "WOK anachnu, chap. xlii. 6; where the nun and 
cheth are both wanting. Or at the end of a word : as "]pK 
for "HEN omru; 1 Sam. xviii. 19. 

3dly. Permutation, or changing one letter for another: as 
nifn for I7DT jidhcha, van for jod, Psalm x. 9; which error 
occurs in twenty-two places : bl&W for biWI veshaal, jod 
for vau, Prov. xx. 4.; Psalm lxxvii. 12; which error occurs 
seventy-five times: bl3 for gedhal, resh for daleth, 
Prov. xix. 19: iTn for haju, he for vau, Josh. xv. 4: 

* Capell. Arcanum, ubi supra, sect. x. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



581 



and HIV f° r "P^ gnabhdhecha, vau for caph final ; 2 Sam 
xiv. 22. 

4thly. Metathesis, or transposition : as for J7\Wja- 

muth, Prov. xix. 15: TWP for jumath; 2 Kings xiv. 6. 

5thly. Separation; when a letter is prefixed to one word, 
which belongs to the next word before it : as H^V? ^ or 

Jl»n hajitha hammotsi, 2 Samuel v. 2: DV^Sn Dttf 
for dvhc^sj HOttf shammah phelishtim ; 2 Sam. xxi. 12. 

From these and the like instances Capel infers, that the 
punctuation was regulated by, and consequently is more mo- 
dern than the kerioth;* the time of collecting which, as I 
have already observed, he endeavours to fix to about five 
hundred years after Christ. We proceed now to the 

Second class of arguments against the antiquity cf the 
vowels,, which are drawn from testimony ; and that, according 
to Capel, is either tacit or express. 

Of the latter sort is the testimony of Aben Ezra, R. David 
Kimchi, R. Jehudah Levita, and R. Elias Levita, who are all 
of this opinion.f 

Tacit or consequential testimony is taken from the copies 
of the law, which are kept and read in the synagogues, or 
from the cabalistic interpretation, or from passages of the 
Talmud. 

1st. From the copies of the law, called mJ"l-19D sepher- 
torah, written on a scroll of parchment, and read every sab- 
bath in the Jewish synagogues. These copies are accounted 
by them the most sacred, and preferred to all others ; and 
they are constantly written without points. But had the 
points been of equal authority with the consonants, doubtless 
a pointed law would have been always looked upon as the 
most sacred .% 

2dly. From the cabalistical interpretations, which relate to 
the consonants, and none of them to the vowels. And hence 

* Capell. Arcanum Punctat. lib. i. cap. xi. sect. xi. et seq. 
f Capell. Arcanum Punctat. lib. i. cap. ii. iii. - Buxtorf. de Punctor. 
Antiq. cap. iii. p. 11, et seq.; et Capell. Vindicise, lib. i. cap. i. 
% Capell Arcanum Punctat. lib. i. cap. iv. 



.582 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



it is inferred, that the vowels were not in being when those 
interpretations were made.* 

3dly. From the Talmud, which contains the " jura etdeci- 
siones magistrorum suorum," the determinations of the doc- 
tors concerning some passages of the law. It is evident, 
they say, the points were not affixed to the text when the 
Talmud was composed, because there are several disputes 
concerning the sense of passages of the law, which could not 
have been disputed had there been points. Besides, they 
never mention the vowels, though they have the fairest oppor- 
tunity and occasion to mention them, had they been then in 
being. In the commentary on this passage of the First Book 
of Kings, " After he that is, Joab, " had smitten every 
male in Edom," chap xi. 15, the Talmud relates, that 
when Joab returned from this expedition he told David, that 
he had smitten every male in Edom. David asked him, why 
he had left the females alive? Joab answers, The law says 
IDT zakar. No, saith David, we read ~ot zeker, memoria. 
Whereupon Joab went to ask his master how he read this 
word? His master read it zeker; and upon this Joab drew 
his sword, with a design to murder him. Now had there 
been points at this time, it would have been impossible to have 
made this mistake : and had there been points when the Tal- 
mud was written, there would have been no room to have 
invented this story, for the points determine it to be zakar. 
And besides, if the talmudists had been in possession of vowel 
points, they would certainly have made use of them in telling 
this story, that so the sense might have been plain, and not 
liable to be misunderstood ; whereas the two words areno ways 
distinguished, being both written with the consonants only. 

Another instance of this sort occurs in the twelfth chapter 
of Leviticus and the fifth verse, where the talmudists dispute 
about the meaning of the word D^JDt#« These consonants 
signify either two weeks, or seventy days. Now had the 
vowel points been then used, they would have had the fairest 
opportunity of saying it must be two weeks, because there is 
a kibbutz under the beth ; and they would doubtless have 

* Capell. ubi supra, cap. v. sect, i.— iii. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 583 

written it DJlQltf shebhungnaim; whereas they put down only 
the consonants. 

Again, on the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah and the seven- 
teenth verse they dispute, whether fOl-^D signifies children, 
or builders. The consonants may signify either, but the 
vowels determine it to mean children.* 

We proceed now to the 

Third sort of arguments, which Capel draws from the 
Chaldee Paraphrases of Jonathan and Onkelos, the Greek 
versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, and espe- 
cially that of the Septuagint, by which he endeavours to 
prove, that the copy from which they translated was without 
points. This appears with respect to them all, from their 
translating several words in a sense different from that which 
the points determine them to mean. I shall select some in- 
stances from the Septuagint only. In the fifteenth chapter of 
Genesis, and the eleventh verse, for DJTIK IMF) vajjashebh 
otham, " he drove them away," the Seventy read D.TIN 3gj1 
vajjhhtbh ittam, and accordingly render it Km avvEKaOsaev 
avroiQ, he sat down by them (that is, the carcasses), to watch 
them, that the fowls might not devour them. In the forty- 
seventh chapter and the thirty-first verse, for HIDDn ham- 
mitah, a bed, they read nEftn hammatteh, a staff, and ac- 
cordingly translate it pafidov avrov. In the eighteenth chapter 
and the twelfth verse, for firry gnedhnah, pleasure, they 
read rWflV. gnadhennah, hitherto, rendering it cwc rov vw. 
In the thirty-second Psalm and the fifth verse, " I said, I 
will confess my transgressions," or upon my transgressions, 
for gnalti, upon, they read ^ gnalai, rendering it 
tear tfj.ov (Psalm xxxi. in the Greek). In the forty-seventh 
Psalm and the tenth verse, for DJ? gnam, the people, they 
read UV gnim, with ; instead of " the people of the God of 
Abraham," it is in their version fxera tov Qwv Afipaan, with the 
God of Abraham. In the thirty- third Psalm and the seventh 
verse, instead of 133 catmedh, like a heap, they read 123 
cannodh, like a bottle, rendering it waei cktkov. In the ninth 



* Capell. ubi supra, sect. iv. et seq. 



5#4 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



chapter of Hosea and the first verse, for bit el, to, they read, 
al, not, rendering it jurjSc. In the first chapter of Joel 
and the eighteenth verse, for nabhochu, are perplexed, 
they read nibhchu, wept, from >"D2 bachah, flevit ; and 
accordingly they render it eicXavGav. From these and several 
other instances it is inferred, that the translators of the Sep- 
tuagint had no Bible with points ; or, at least, that the copy 
they translated from was not printed as ours is. 

The instances of the like sort, which Capel produces out of 
the Chaldee Paraphrases, and other ancient versions, are not 
so evidently to the purpose of his argument as those from the 
Septuagint. 

Let us now see what is replied to these arguments of Capel 
by Buxtorf and others, who contend for the high antiquity 
and authority of the Hebrew points. 

First. As to the argument drawn from the ken and 
chethibh : — 

Buxtorf admits the keri and chethibh to have been prior to 
the points; and therefore, in order to maintain his opinion, 
that Ezra was the author of the points, he asserts, that it was 
Ezra, and not the Masorites of Tiberias, who first collected 
the kerioth, and then regulated by them the punctuation in 
the text.* We have already taken notice of the reasons 
which Capel offers on the contrary, for allowing the kerioth 
no higher antiquity than the time of the Masorites of Ti- 
berias. 

There are others, who assert, that the various lections, 
which are to be found in the Masorah, and part of which are 
inserted in the margin of the Hebrew Bible, are made upon 
the vowels as well as upon the consonants ;f and they endea- 
vour to show, that the various lections upon the consonants 
are owing to the irregularity of the vowels; and if so, the 
vowels must have been prior to these marginal corrections. 
Thus they prove the antiquity of the points from the keri and 
chethibh; and their argument is this: There are many in- 

* Buxtorf. de Antiq. Functor, part. i. cap. viii.; and, on the other side, 
Capell. Vindicise Arcani, lib. i. cap. ix. 

f See Whitfield's Dissertation on the Hebrew Vowel-points, sect. ix. p. 
134, et seq. Liverpool, 1748. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



585 



stances, where the consonants in the margin are plainly 
fitted to the vowels in the text. But had there been no 
vowels in the text when the keri were made, there would 
have been no occasion for these corrections; for the text 
might have been read with other vowels, and the sense of it 
much mended. For instance, in the eighth chapter of Ge- 
nesis and the seventeenth verse, where the word in the text 
is N?pn havtse, bring forth, the keri reads fctiTTT hajjetse, 
divide ; which is plainly suited to the punctuation in the text; 
for had there been no points, they would rather have read it 
N2pn hotse, as it ought to be, and then there would have 
been no occasion for this marginal correction. There is much 
such another instance in the fifth Psalm and the ninth verse, 
where havshar in the text is corrected by 1t£Pn haj- 

shar in the margin ; whereas it ought to be m W i \T\ hoshar, or 
"l^iH hosher, in the imperative hiphil, from *W jashar, 
rectus fuit. In the twenty-first Psalm and the second verse, 
the word bw jageil, exultabit, is changed in the keri into 
b^jagel; but the consonants in the text are regular in hiphil, 
and should be pointed bw jagil. There could, therefore, 
be no reason for the keri to leave out the letter jod, but only 
to make the consonants suit to the erroneous punctuation in 
the text. In the fifty-first Psalm and the fourth verse, rOin 
multiplied, in the text, is corrected by 2*1)1 herebh in the 
margin. Now had there been no points in the text, they 
would doubtless have read rOTH harbeh, of which 3hH 
herebh is nothing but a contraction. In the fifty-ninth Psalm 
and the sixteenth verse, VttW jenungnun, vagabuntur, is 
made in the keri suited to the erroneous punctuation, 

VWT; for had there been no points, instead of making this 
correction, they would doubtless have read it V)JW, as it 
ought to be ; for the sense is plainly in kal. In the seventy- 
seventh Psalm and the twelfth verse, "P3tN recordabor ; in 
the margin it is "VD?N ezchor ; whereas it might have been as 
well read "V3TK azchir in hiphil. In Psalm the eighty-ninth 
and eighteenth verse, exultabit, is changed by the keri 

into Dili! tarum, in kal; whereas tarim, in hiphil, better 



586 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



agrees with the context. See more instances of the kind in 
the eighty-fifth Psalm and first verse, the hundred and fifth 
Psalm and eighteenth and twenty-eighth verses, the hundred 
and fortieth Psalm and ninth verse, the hundred forty-fifth 
Psalm and sixth and eighth verses ; and especially the thirtieth 
Psalm and the fourth verse, where from ll^jaradk, 

descendit, is corrected in the keri by leaving out the vau, and 
so making it the infinitive or gerund kal, with the affix Joe?, 
HTQ, a descendere me; whereas the sense is better if we 
retain the van, and point it as the participle HTiPO mijjored- 
hei; according to the Seventy, who render it airo ttwv tcara- 
fiaivovTwv; which is followed in the old English version, "Thou 
shalt keep my life from them that go down into the pit." 
This instance is said to have convinced Pocock, above all 
others, of the antiquity of the points. 

However, it may be observed on this argument, that it sup- 
poses the kerioth not to have been various readings collected 
from manuscripts, but corrections of the text, made in con- 
formity to an anomalous punctuation. Now, admitting that 
this erroneous pointing was prior to the kerioth, would it not 
have been more natural to have put a keri upon the vowels, 
than to have placed erroneous consonants in the margin, in 
conformity with erroneous vowels in the text? If we sup- 
pose the kerioth to have been the various readings of dif- 
ferent copies, all that seems necessary to. account for their 
being often worse than the readings in the text, is to suppose, 
that those who collected them were very injudicious persons, 
or had a great reverence for particular copies, the readings of 
which they on that account preferred, though less eligible in 
themselves than the readings in the text. Besides, supposing 
the kerioth were made in conformity with the vowels in the 
text, w r e must then suppose likewise, that, with respect to the 
instances where we meet with points in the text without con- 
sonants, the transcriber wrote the points, forgetting at the 
same time to write the consonants, which is very hard to con- 
ceive; and where we meet with consonants without points, if 
the points were there when the kerioth were made, why 
should the points be omitted in the text any more than the 
consonants ? To the 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



587 



Second class of arguments against the antiquity of the 
points, which are taken from the Sepher-Torah, the Cabala 
and Talmud, it is replied, 

1st. As to the Sepher-Torah, # it is acknowledged, that 
the copies of the law which were publicly read in the Jewish 
synagogues, were always, at least as far back as we can trace 
them, without points. But to the inference, that the points 
are of modern invention, because the Jews durst not make 
any alteration in their law, but would transcribe it just as they 
found it, it is replied : that from hence it might as well be 
proved, that the keri did originally belong to the law (which 
is absurd to imagine), as that the points did not. The Jews 
give two reasons for the Sepher-Torah's being written with- 
out points. The one is, that it is thereby capable of more 
mysterious interpretations ; the other, that every one is bound 
to write over the law once in his life, or at least to get it 
written for him ; and it must be written without any blunder, 
for one blunder profanes the whole. It is therefore proper 
it should be written without points, because in such a vast 
number of points it would be morally impossible to avoid 
blunders. 

Perhaps a third reason may be added for the Sepher- 
Torah's being written without points, namely, that being 
written merely for the use of such persons as are well versed 
in the Hebrew tongue (for it is not to be supposed that any 
others are employed as public readers in the synagogue), there 
was no need to write it with the points, they being very ca- 
pable of reading without them. But as M. T. C. is sufficient 
for one who is versed in the Roman contractions, while a more 
unskilful person cannot read unless Marcus Tullius Cicero be 
wrote at length ; so those copies, which were written merely 
for the use of the learned in the Hebrew language, being 
written without points, will by no means prove that points 
were not necessary for, and anciently used by, the more un- 
learned. 

As for the assertion, that the Jews durst not make any 
alteration in their law, but would transcribe it just as they 
found it, and that therefore they would have inserted the 

* See Buxtorf. de Antiq. Punctor. parti, cap. iv. ; and, on the other hand, 
Capell. Vindiciae Arcani, lib. i. cap. ii. 



588 THE HEBREW POINTS. 

points into the Sepher-Torah, if they had then been used 
originally, or had been invented by Ezra ; this supposes, that 
the same superstitious regard was always paid to the charac- 
ters and letters in which the law was written, as hath been 
done since the time of the Masorites of Tiberias ; and that 
the Jews would have scrupled to write out copies without 
points, for the use of their public readers, who did not need 
them; which is not probable, even though they had looked 
on the vowel points to be as authentic as the consonants. 

Again, though the modern Sepher-Torah is written without 
points, yet we cannot be certain how the fact hath always 
been, particularly how it was in the time of Ezra ; for there 
are no copies of the law now extant, near so ancient as his 
time. As for the copy in the church of St. Dominick, in 
Bononia, pretended to be written by Ezra himself, it is in a 
fair character on a sort of leather, and made up in a roll ac- 
cording to the ancient manner ; and it hath the vowel points ; 
but the freshness of the writing, which hath suffered no decay, 
prevents our believing it to be near so ancient as is pretended. 
We are not informed, whether the points in this manuscript 
appear to have been written by a later hand than the conso- 
nants ; but in many manuscripts, examined by Dr. Kennicott, 
and those some of the oldest and best, either there are no 
points at all, or they are evidently a late addition. # The 

Second argument against the antiquity of the points was 
drawn from the Talmud, w T hich makes no mention of them. 
To which it is replied,^ not only that there are books said by 
Buxtorf to be older than the Talmud, though rejected by 
Capel as spurious, in which they are expressly mentioned ; 
but likewise that it is highly probable the talmudists, though 
they make no mention of the points, nevertheless used pointed 
copies; because all the senses they give of Scripture are 
agreeable to the present punctuation ; whereas if there had 

* See Dr. Kennicott's first Dissert, on the Hebrew Text, p. 313 — 342, 
passim. And Js. Vossius asserts, that in examining above two thousand 
Hebrew MSS. he had never met with any pointed, that were above 600 
years old ; or if the books were older, the points were a late addition ; 
Voss. de Sept. Interp. Translat. cap. 30. 

See Buxtorf. de Antiq. Punctor. part i. cap. vi. ; and, in answer to him, 
Capell. Vindiciae Arcani, lib. i. cap. vii. ; see also above, p. 575-. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



589 



been no points, it can hardly be thought they would always 
have given the same sense of words as the points determine 
them to mean. As to the 

Third argument, which is taken from the Cabala ; it is re- 
plied, that both ancient and modern cabalistical writers have 
found mysteries in the points, as well as the consonants. For 
instances of which see " Buxtorf de Antiquitate Punctorum," # 
and what Capel saith in confutation of him.f The 

Third sort of arguments against the antiquity of the points 
was drawn from comparing the ancient versions, particularly 
the Septuagint, with the original 5 by which, they say, it ap- 
pears, that the Hebrew copies, which those ancient inter- 
preters used, had no points. But those of the contrary opi- 
nion remark,^ 

1st. That hereby one argument for the antiquity of the 
points is greatly confirmed ; namely, that without them the 
sense would be uncertain. It is pretended indeed, that 
though there are a number of Hebrew words of different 
significations, whose consonants are the same ; yet where 
these words occur, the context will always determine the true 
meaning. But we see the contrary in those ancient versions, 
which are made from copies without points ; for they have 
frequently mistaken the sense by reading with wrong vowels. 

2dly. They remark, that if this argument proves any thing, 
it proves too much; for if the copies we now have of the 
Septuagint be just transcripts of the original version, we may 
as easily prove by it, that the Hebrew copy from whence that 
version was made had no consonants, as that it had no 
vowels; since it differed as much from our copy in the 
former as in the latter. This appears in a variety of in- 
stances, not only as to the letters, but likewise as to words 
and sentences. 

In the first place, as to letters : there are many instances, 

1st. Of the metastoicheiosis, or putting one letter for ano- 
ther. In the fifty-sixth Psalm and the ninth verse, instead 
of N, their copy must have had J, in the word "pson ; for they 

* Part i. cap. v. 

f Capell. Vindic. Arcani, part i. cap. viii. 

I See Buxtorf. de Antiq. Punctor. part i. cap. ix. x. • and, on the other 
side, Capell. Vindiciae Arcani, lib. i. cap. iv. v. 



590 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



read it "pJUn, and accordingly render it zvwmov gov. In the 
sixtieth chapter of Isaiah and the fifteenth verse, for n they 
read ? ; for "my transiens, my auxilians, and accordingly they 
render it 6 fior)6ujv. In the thirty-fourth chapter of Ezekiel 
and the sixteenth verse, for 1 they read 1 ; for T>DltfN disper- 
dam, n>DltfK custodiam. In the eighth chapter of the First 
Book of Samuel and the sixteenth verse, for n they read "> ; 
for nt£>yi etfaciet, they read Titfjn, and render it km cnroStKaTtiJGu, 
et decimabit. In the sixtieth Psalm and sixth verse, for D 
they read n, for IDi£>p Veritas, nitfp arms. In the sixth chapter 
of the First Book of Samuel and the eighteenth verse, for b they 
read 3 ; for ^ON, pN \&oq. In the third chapter of Ezekiel and 
the eighth verse, for D they read 3 ; for Qnxnfrontem eorum, 
DD¥J, viKog avrwv. On the contrary, in the First Book of Sa- 
muel, the twenty-third chapter and the seventh verse, for 3 they 
read D ; for ~D3 tradidit, they read *"DD vendidit. In the hundred 
and fourth Psalm and the twelfth verse, for j/ they read p ; for 
DWDy frondes, DWDp, and translate it Trtrpot, rupes. In the 
third chapter of Genesis and the fifteenth verse, for D they 
read "t; for "jDli^ conteret tibi, they doubtless read "pity* 
which they render aov Tr\pr]aH, sc. K£<pa\r)v. In the eighth 
chapter of Isaiah and the twentieth verse, for i they read 1 ; 
for -initf aurora, munus. Again, in the thirteenth chapter 
of Zechariah and the first verse, for n they read D ; for "npD 
fons, DlpD locus. In the thirty-seventh chapter of Isaiah and 
the twenty-fifth verse, for n they read 17 ; for WiTSEH et bibi, 
they read Wffiin, as if from nro perdidit ; and accordingly 
they render it fipruiuxja. 

2dly. There are instances of epenthesis, or letters inserted 
in words in the copies they translated from, which are not in 
the present copy. In the twenty-eighth chapter of Proverbs 
and the twenty-eighth verse, Dipn in surgendo, they read DlpD3, 
and render it ev tottoiq, in locis. 

3dly. Metathesis, or changing the place of letters in a word. 
In the twentieth Psalm and the sixth verse, for bill vexillum 
erigemus, they read bm, from bll gadhal, magnus fuit, and 
render it nzya\.vv%r\aofi$a (Psalm xix. 5, in the Greek). 

4thly. Aphaeresis, or leaving out letters. In Isaiah, the 
fourteenth chapter and thirty-second verse, for <ON^D nuncii, 
they read ^/D reges, and render it fia<jt\eic Svwv. 



THE HEBREW POINTS. 



591 



Thus much for a specimen of the difference in letters, be- 
tween the Hebrew copy, from which the Seventy translated, 
and ours. 

Secondly. There appears also to have been a considerable 
difference in whole words and sentences. In the second 
chapter of Job, and the ninth verse, there is a long speech of 
Job's wife in the Septuagint, which is not in the present He- 
brew copy. At the end of the forty-second chapter there is 
a long genealogical history, which is said to be taken out of a 
Syriac book. There is a whole Psalm added at the end of the 
book of Psalms. Twenty verses are left out of the First Book 
of Samuel, about the middle of the seventeenth chapter. # In 
the seventeenth of Jeremiah there are four verses wanting in 
the beginning; and in the thirty-third chapter (chap. xl. in 
the Greek), thirteen verses at the end. There are also strange 
transpositions, particularly the thirty-sixth, thirty-seventh, 
thirty-eighth, and thirty-ninth chapters of Exodus are miser- 
ably confused. 

So that upon the whole it appears, that if the Septuagint 
version we now have be genuine, the Hebrew copy it was 
translated from differed greatly from our present copy, as well 
in the consonants as the vowels ; and therefore it is said, that 
the argument drawn from this version against the antiquity of 
the points will either prove too much, or nothing at all. 

As to the hypothesis of Dr. Prideaux,f that the points 
were added to the Hebrew text soon after Ezra's time by the 
ancient Masorites, and used in their schools in teaching to 
read the Bible, yet not received into the schools of the rab- 
bies till several hundred years afterward ; in support of the 
former assertion, he alleges the utter impossibility of teaching 
to read the Hebrew without points, when it was become a 
dead language ; which it is allowed on all hands to have been 
ever since the captivity. 

This opinion, that the points were invented and used by 
the Masorites soon after the time of Ezra, who is supposed 
to have settled the true meaning of the Hebrew text, makes 
their authority very considerable. But if it can be proved, 
that they were invented a little after Ezra's time, because they 

* See Dr. Kennicott's second Dissert, on the Hebrew Text, p. 418 — 431, 
554—558. 

f Prideaux's Connect, vol. ii. part i. book v. p. 505, &c. 



592 GENERAL DIVISIONS OF THE BIBLE. 

were necessary to teach the reading of the Hebrew, when it 
was become a dead language ; I see not, but the same argu- 
ment will prove they were invented in his time ; for the He- 
brew was a dead language then as well as after. 

The latter assertion, that they were not introduced into 
the schools of the rabbies till some hundred years after- 
ward, is advanced in order to account for the silence of the 
Talmud, Josephus, and Philo, with most of the ancient 
Christian fathers, concerning them. Now this silence will 
indeed prove, that there was no dispute about them in those 
times ; but, whatever presumption it may be, it is no demon- 
stration, that they were not then used even in the schools of 
the rabbies. 

Indeed it was so natural for the inventors of the alphabet 
to contrive characters for the vowels as well as the consonants, 
that no small presumption arises from hence, that the present 
points were coeval with the consonants, unless the matres 
lectionis are supposed to have been the original vowels. To 
which some add, the use of the points in determining the 
different meaning of several words, which have the same con- 
sonants; particularly in distinguishing the two conjugations 
of pihel and puhal, in all the moods and tenses except the 
infinitive. And this shows the modern points to be at least 
as ancient as the present structure of Hebrew grammar. 
However, this controversy not admitting of demonstration on 
either side of the question, I shall leave you, after considering 
what hath been said, and what Buxtorf and Capel have fur- 
ther offered, to judge for yourselves, on which side the great- 
est probability lies ; and proceed next to consider the usual 
divisions of the Hebrew Bible. 

Of the general Partitions and Divisions of the Bible. 

The general title of the whole is nynnxi DVWJF nesrim vear- 
bangnah, that is, the twenty-four, because it contains twenty- 
four books ; though, from a passage of Josephus, in his first 
book against Appion, it appears, that in his time they divided 
the whole Bible into twenty-two books, corresponding to the 
number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. He saith, we have 
only twenty-two books, which are deservedly believed to be 
of divine authority, of which five are the books of Moses. 



GEN EE A L 



DIVISIONS OF TH E 



BIBLE. 



593 



The prophets, who were the successors of Moses, have 
written thirteen. The remaining four books contain hymns 
to God, and documents of life for the use of men.* 

At present the Jew T s make the sacred books to be twenty- 
four ; for they reckon Ezra and Nehemiah as one book, and 
the twelve minor prophets as one, and the two books of Sa- 
muel, of Kings, and of Chronicles, each as one book, which 
reduces the thirty-nine books, according to our division, to 
twenty-four. And these twenty-four they distinguish into five 
of the law, eight of the prophets, and eleven of the hagiogra- 
pha. The law, or pentateuch, which they call mm vttfDin nt^Dn 
chamishah chumishei tor ah, that is, quinque quint a legis, con- 
tains the five books of Moses, each of which is called by 
the word with which it begins, or the most considerable near 
the beginning, as Bereshith, Skemoth, &c. The prophets, in 
Hebrew nebhiim, are distinguished into DMT^iO 

nebhiim rishonim, or former prophets, which are Joshua, 
Judges, Samuel, and Kings ; and the DVJnnN nebhiim 
acharoitim, or the latter prophets, which are again distin- 
guished into the major es, which are Isaiah, Jeremiah, and 
Ezekiel ; and the twelve minores, namely, Hosea, Joel, &c, 
which are all reckoned one book. 

The hagiographa, or D'Oiro "iDD sepher chctubbim, contain 
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Canticles, Ruth, Lamentations, Ec- 
clesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles. 
But in some books, as Athias's and Plantin's editions, the 
r6\3D l^Dn chamesh megillath, that is, the books of Canticles, 
Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther, are placed just 

* Joseph, contra Appion. lib. i. sect. viii. torn. ii. p. 441, edit. Haverc. 
This passage of Josephus is much insisted on by Mr. Whiston and some 
others, to disprove the divine authority of the book of Canticles. We have 
now, they say, five books in our Bibles, which answer to this title, Hymns 
to God, and Documents of Life for the use of Men ; namely, Job, Psalms, 
Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Canticles ; whereas it is plain, that in Jose- 
phus's time there were but four. Therefore the book of Canticles, they con- 
ceive, hath been added since. See Mr. Whiston's Supplement to his Essay 
toward restoring the true text of the Old Testament, proving that the Can- 
ticles is not a sacred book, printed 1723 ; and, on the other side, a Defence 
of the Canon of the Old Testament, in answer to Mr. Whiston, by William 
Itchinger, M. A. 1723. 

2 Q 



\ 



594 GENERAL DIVISIONS OF THE BIBLE. 

after the Pentateuch ; and then the hagiographa contain only 
Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chro- 
nicles. The reason why the Jews divide them in this manner 
is, that they might have no occasion to carry the whole Bible 
to their synagogue, but only the Pentateuch and those five 
books which are read at different feasts, namely, Canticles at 
the passover, Ruth at the pentecost, Lamentations at the fast 
which is kept in July in commemoration of the burning of the 
temple, Ecclesiastes at the feast of tabernacles, and Esther at 
the feast of purim. This last book is written in a little roll by 
itself, and called mux nSjD megillath Esther, from bbi galal, 
volvit.* 

The division of the Bible into these three parts, the law, the 
prophets, and the hagiographa, seems to be referred to in the 
following passage of St. Luke : " All things must be fulfilled, 
which are written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, 
and in the Psalms, concerning me chap. xxiv. 44. As the 
book of Psalms stood first in the hagiographa, or the third di- 
vision, that whole division was commonly called the Psalms, 
as the whole book of Genesis is named by the first word in it, 
and so several other books. This enumeration, therefore, the 
Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms, includes the whole Bible. 

On the same principle Dr. Lightfoot accounts for a sup- 
posed false citation in St. Matthew, chap, xxvii. 9, 10, " Then 
was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy, the prophet, 
saying, And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of 
him that was valued, whom they of the children of Israel 
did value, and gave them for the potters' field." The passage 
here cited is not in Jeremiah, but in Zechariah. Accordingly 
Beza styles this difficulty, " Nodus, qui vetustissimos quosque 
interpretes torsit." St. Austin supposes it to be afiapr^fxa 
fxvi)iiovLKov, a slip of St. Matthew's memory, which is by no 
means to be admitted, if we allow that he wrote by the special 
guidance of the Spirit of God. Dr. Wall, observing that 
Dr. Mill supposes it to be a lapsus calami of St. Matthew, 
thinks it more likely that the Greek translator of his Gospel 
should have been thus mistaken than the evangelist himself; 



* See, on this subject, Buxtorf. Tiberias, cap. xi. 



EDITIONS OF THE BIBLE. 



595 



and if so, saith he, it is pity somebody did not do here as 
St. Jerome did in a similar difficulty relating to " Zacharias, 
the son of Barachias," who is said to have been " slain be- 
tween the temple and the altar ;" namely, consult the He- 
brew copy of St. Matthew's Gospel before it was lost.* In- 
deed St. Jerome saith, with respect to the present difficulty, 
that a Nazarene Jew showed him a book, accounted an apo- 
cryphal book of the prophet Jeremiah, where this passage is 
expressed verbatim. f 

The learned Joseph Mede conceives, that these words, as 
well as several passages which now stand in the book of Ze- 
chariah, were originally spoken by Jeremiah, but have been 
misplaced through the unskilfulness of the persons who col- 
lected their prophecies.^ 

However, Dr. Lightfoot, by testimonies from the rabbies, 
shows us, that Jeremiah did anciently stand first in the book 
of the Prophets. And hence he came to be mentioned before 
all the rest in the following passage of St. Matthew, " Some 
say that thou art John the Baptist, some Elias, and others Je- 
remias, or one of the prophets chap.xvi. 14. Accordingly, 
as the whole hagiographa is called the Psalms, from the 
Psalms being; the first book, so the whole volume of the Pro- 
phets is for the same reason called Jeremiah. § 

There is yet another, and perhaps more probable, conjec- 
ture of Bishop Hall, who imagines, that Zechariah having 
been written contractedly Zpiov, was by some transcriber mis- 
taken for Ipiov. 

Others after all suppose, that the name of the prophet is an 
erroneous marginal addition, now crept into the text, since 
the Syriac version only saith, " It was spoken by the pro- 
phet," without mentioning his name. 

I shall conclude the whole with an account of the most con- 
siderable editions of the Bible. I mean those which may be 
called pompous editions ; for the plain, or the mere editions of 
the Hebrew text, are too numerous for our attempting a de- 

* See Dr. Wail's Critical Notes on the New Testament, on Matt, xxiii. 35. 
f See Dr. Wall on Matt, xxvii. 9, 10. 

X Mede's Works, book iv. epist. xxxi. p. 786, London, 1677. 
§ Lightfoot's Horse Hebraicae, on Matt, xxvii. 9. 

2 Q 2 



596 



EDITIONS OF THE BIBLE. 



tail of them. By the pompous editions, otherwise called 
Opera Biblica, I intend those which contain not only the sa- 
cred text, but likewise some commentaries, or versions, joined 
with it ; and they are chiefly these four, the Biblia Complu- 
tensia, Biblia Regia, Biblia Parisiensia, and Biblia Polyglotta. 

The Biblia Complutensia, so called from Complutum in 
Spain, where the work was printed, is contained in one volume 
folio. It was published under the care of Cardinal Ximenes, 
anno 1514, containing the Old Testament in Hebrew, the 
vulgar Latin, the Targum of Onkelos on the Pentateuch, and 
the Septuagint version, with the Latin translation of both ; 
also the New Testament in Greek and Latin. 

The Biblia Regia, so called from Philip II. of Spain, at 
whose charge the work was executed, contains eight volumes, 
printed at Antwerp, anno dom. 1571, with a better letter and 
paper than the former. Arias Montanus had the greatest 
share in this work, which contains several things more than 
the Complutensian, namely, the Chaldee Paraphrase on all 
the Old Testament, with a Latin version of it; the inter- 
lineary version of the New Testament ; and also the New 
Testament in Syriac, expressed both in Hebrew and Syriac 
characters. 

The Biblia Parisiensia, in ten volumes, was printed at 
Paris, anno dom. 1645, at the charge of a private man, 
Michael de Jay, and therefore it is also called Jay's Bible. 
It was done under the direction and care of Dr. Gabriel Sio- 
nita, professor of the Oriental languages at Paris, of Johannes 
Morinus, and Abraham Ecchellensis. 

It exceeds the Biblia Regia both in paper and in print ; it 
hath, besides all which that contains, the Pentateuch in Sa- 
maritan, all the Old Testament in Syriac, and both Testa- 
ments in Arabic. 

The Anglicanum opus Biblicum, called the Polyglot, was 
printed chiefly under the care of Dr. Bryan Walton, in six 
volumes, at London, 1657. This contains several things 
which Jay's Bible hath not. It has Arias Montanus's inter- 
linearry version, the Septuagint from the Vatican and Alex- 
andrian copies, which are supposed to be the best ; the old 
Vulgate Latin translation of the Septuagint, which alone, he 



EDITIONS. OF THE BIBLE. 



597 



tells you, is that which the Latin church used four hundred 
years after the apostles. It has the Persic Pentateuch in the 
Persic character ; the Psalms, Canticles, and New Testament 
in the Ethiopic ; the Jerusalem Targum, the Chaldee Para- 
phrase of Jonathan,* &c. 

Dr. Edmund Castell, Arabic professor at Cambridge, pub- 
lished a Lexicon for the use of Walton's Polyglot, in two 
volumes folio, which generally goes with it, making in all 
eight volumes. 

* See the Preface to the London Polyglot. 



INDEX OF TEXTS 



ILLUSTRATED OR EXPLAINED. 



GENESIS. 

Chap. Ver. Page 

i. 5 402, 403 

26—28 . . 101 

29,30.... 209, 2 10, note 

ii. 3 432,433 

2, 3 445, 446 

7. . . -. 553 

iii. 21 20S, 209 

iv. 3 410 

4 101, 102 

13, 14 2,3 

15 3,4 

23, 24 4,5 

vii. 2 102, 103 

6, 11 461 

viii. 21 446 

ix. 3 209,210, note 

22—25 7—9 

x. 8, 9 6 

21 70 

xi. 1,6,7,9 559—561 

xiv. 13 71 

xv. 5 25 1 

xxi. 9, &c 9,10 

33 392 

xxxi. 39 224 

xxxv. 2 91 

xxxviii. 24 10, 11 

xlix. 7 10,197,198 

10 51—54 

26 285 

EXODUS. 

iii. 5 165 

6 165 



Chap. Ver. Pase 

iii. 16 12 

21 338 

iv. 29 12 

v. 14 12 

xii. 2 453 

5 460—462 

6 459, 460 

8, 11, 46. . . .468— 471 

9 467 

10 471 

22. . 465, 466 

22, 23 472 

35, 36 338 

48 90 

xvi. 23—26 433, 434 

xx. 8 438,439 

24 395 

xxi. 1—6 533,534 

xxiii. 16 496, 497 

xxiv. 1,9,14 25 

5 131, 132 

xxvi. 23 339 

xxvii. 5 343 

9 341 

xxviii. 6 154, 155 

8 155 

9—12 155 

15 156 

30 158—162 

31—34 150—154 

36—38 156—158 

40 146—148 

41 170 

42 145, 146 

xxix. 20 169 



600 



INDEX Or TEXTS. 



Chap. Ver. 


Page 




. . 152, 153 


OO 




on on 




.. . . in i /? 


On o a 


23—25 


141 


30 


130 


31—33 


142 




, . 437, 438 


16, 17 


98 


xxxiv. 22 


509 




441 


xxxvi. 33 


339 


xxxviii. 4 


343 


8.. . 


.344 


xxxix. 27 


147 


LEVITICUS. 


v 6 8 


997 


15 16 


18 19 


x. 1 2 


134 






x vi . 4 


147 


8 


518 521 


1 A 1 t 

14, 15 


. 524, 525 


29 


5 IS 514 






xxi. 10 — 12 


J 71 — 176 


13 14 


170 171 




. . 365 


11 


481,482 


15, 16 


483 


24 


.508 


40 


491—494 


xxv. 2 


.528,529 


3,4 


529—531 


10, 11 


539, 540 


45 


97 




39, 40 


NUMBERS. 




iv. 3, 23, 43 . . . 


186,187 


vi. 3,4 


290 


9—12 


, 289 


viii. 10 


199 


11 


198,199 


24,25 


186, 187 


x. 4 


25 


35, 36 


15 


xi. 16 


25 


25 


25 1 


xiii. 8,16 


..20,21 ! 



Chap. Ver. Taee 

xiii. 32 21 

xiv. 41,42 15 

xxi. 14 14 

xxiv. 24 72 

xxv. 12, 13 135 

xxvii. 20 15 

xxviii. 11, 19, 27 494 

15 505 

xxix. 1 506 

36 494, 495 

xxxii. 2 25 

xxxv. 4,5 201,202 

DEUTERONOMY. 

v. 12 442—444 

xii. 13, 14 391,395 

xiv. 21 97 

23.... 205 

xv. 1—3 532, 533 

xvi. 8 454 

18 24 

21 391 

xvii. 9 30 

14 to the end . 111—119 

17 59 

xviii. 15 22 

xxiii. l,&c 96,97 

xxxii. 8 562 

xxxiii. 5 19,20 

16.... 285 

xxxiv. 10 257 

JOSHUA. 

v. 14, 15 165 

vi. 4 537,538 

xxiv. 26 —...382, 383 

JUDGES. 

viii. 14 23 

xi. 5,6 23 

30—40 ,..31—41 

1 SAMUEL, 
i. 1,19.. 263 

ii. 27, et seq 137 

iii. 2—4 241 

viii. 5—7... Ill 

7 .16 

ix. 9 235,236 

x. 1 121 

5 262 



INDEX OF TEXTS. 



601 



Chap. Ver. Page 

x. 6,7 133 

xii. 12 16 

xvi. 23 243, 244 

xvii. 17, 18 59 

2 SAMUEL. 

viii. 17 135, 136 

x. 4,5 146 

xii. 30 124, 125 

xiv. 26 286—288 

xxiv. 56,57 

24 353 

1 KINGS. 

i. 39 . ... 121 

xii. 28, 29 349, 350 

2 KINGS. 

iii. 12, 13, 15 243 

iv. 29 422, 423 

v 104—107 

xvi. 18 439 

xx. 9—11 404,405 

xxiv. 10, et seq 43, 44 



1 CHRONICLES. 

v. 17 87 

ix. 1 87 

xv. 16 192, 193 

xxi. 25. 353 

xxii. 14 354 

xxiii. 4 196,197 

xxvi. 20 195 

xxviii. 11—13 181, 182 

xxix. 4,6,7 354 

15 71 

2 CHRONICLES. 

v. 13... 191 

xii. 15 86 



EZRA. 

i. 2 355 

ii. 65 188 

vi. 17 .45 

viii. 35 45 

NEHEMIAH. 

ii. 1 453 

6 46 

vii. 64, 65 88,89 



Chap. Ver. Page 

vii. 67 188 

viii. 15 492 

xiii. 1—3..: 96,97 

24 564 

ESTHER, 
ix. 20— ult 544—548 

JOB. 

i. 6 : 431 

PSALMS. 

ii. 12 125 

xl. 6 211, 534,535 

xlv. 1 267 

7 144 

10 95 

1. 8—14 211 

li. 8, 10— 12.... 242, 243 

16 211 

lv. 17 408 

lxxiv. 8 364 

lxxx. 1 13,351 

lxxxi. 3 502 

I lxxxix. 20 121 

xcviii. 6 188 

xcix. 1 13,351 

civ. 15 152 

ex. 4 130 

exxxiii. 2 122, 151 

ISAIAH. 

iv. 5 365 

xx. 2,3 249—253 

xxx. 29 191 

xxxiii. 18 267 

xliv. 28. 45 

xlv. 1—4 45 

liii. 4,12 219 

lviii. 5 513,514 

lxi. 1,2.. 542 

JEREMIAH. 

vii. 22. . 210—214 

xiii. 4,5 249—253 

xxv. 15—29 250 

xxvii. 3 250 

xxviii. 10 - 253 

xxxv. 6, 7 294, 295 

xxxvi. 4,32 267 



602 



INDEX OF TEXTS. 



Chap. Ver. 



Page 



LAMENTATIONS. 

ii. 8 359 

EZEKIEL. 

iii. 17 263 

iv 249—253 

xii. 6 249 

xvi. 10 340 

DANIEL. 

iii. 15 40o 

iv. 19 405 

ix. 24 411 

HOSEA. 

i. 2 249,251 



JOEL. 



ii. 28. 



AMOS. 



ii. 11 



244 
290 



ZECHARIAH. 
vi. 12 524,525 



ii. 23.... 292 

iii. 15 139 

iv. 15 78 

vi. 29 126 

x. 10 468,469 

9 149 

xii. 40 530 

xvi. 14 305 

21 183 

xvii. 24—26 57,58 

xxiii. 2,3 272 

5 308—312 

7—9 281—283 

15 95 

34 265 

xxiv. 20 531 

xxvi. 17 478 

65 175 

xxviii. 1 401 

MARK. 

i. 22 270 

iii. 6 327—330 



Chap. Ver. Page 

vi. 8 469 

xiii. 1 358 

xiv. 12 478 

xv. 25 406 

LUKE. 

i. 5,9,11 499 

ii. 2 61,62 

46 378 

iii. 4 — 6 398 

23 500 

iv. 20 375 

vi. 1 428,429 

12 379 

vii. 28 241 

ix. 3 469 

x. 1,4 423,424 

xi. 44 268, 269 

xiv. 26 95 

xvi. 22.. : 427 

xix. 2 64 

xxi. 5 358,362 

JOHN. 

ii. 6 425,426 

20 361 

iii. 10 94 

iv. 9 319 

v. 2 359 

2—4 385—389 

viii. 20 361 

ix. 22 390 

x. 22 357, 548—550 

23 359 

xii. 20 75 

42 390 

xiii. 1,2 456,457 

23 427 

29 456 

xiv. 23 234 

xvi. 2 390 

xviii. 28 458 

xix. 14 406, 45S 

xx. 16 284 

ACTS. 

i. 12 ...443 

ii. 1 484—486, 488 

5 110,451 

10 no 

hi. 11 359 



INDEX OF TEXTS. 



603 



Chap. 

vi. 



viu. 

ix. 
x. 

xi. 
xiii. 



xi v. 
xv. 
xvi. 



xxn, 
xxiii. 



XXVI 1. 

xxviii, 



Ver. Page I 

I 73 

2 421 I 

9 366—368 

26, et seq 108, 109 

23—29 75 

2 107,108 

19,20 75 : 

2 199 

14, 15 375 

43 89 

23 200 

21 443 

1 74 

13 379 

8—10 378,379 

10 74 

3 377 

5 163 

9 269 

9 510—512 

II 512 



ROMANS. 

i. 1 199 

14 265 

iii. 25 .347 

v. 7,8 297 

xiii. 7 63 



1 
i. 
v. 
viii. 
x. 
xi. 



xiii. 
xiv. 



CORINTHIANS. 

20 265 

7 472—477 

10 231 

2 91 

4 166 

5 238 



21. 
12. 
32. 



420 
345 
256 



2 CORINTHIANS. 

v. 21 224 

xi. 22 73 

GALATIANS. 
iii. 28 67 1 



Chap. Ver. Page 

EPHESIANS. 

ii. 13, 14 360 

14 99 

v. 14 506,507 

PHILIPPIANS. 

iii. 5 73 

COLOSSIANS. 

ii. 18, 23 325 

1 TIMOTHY. 

iii. 13 187 

HEBREWS. 

vii. 14 88 

ix. 3,4 351,352 

7.o 523 

x. 4.... 18 

5 534, 535 

6 224 

xi. 4 212 

32 36—39 

40 38, 39 

xii. 23 449 

xiii. 11, 12 226 

15 229 

JAMES. 

ii. 2 126 

2—4 376,377 

1 PETER. 

i. 12 348 

2 PETER. 

i. 16—19 259—261 

21 242, 253, 255 

JUDE. 

12 421 

REVELATION. 

xi. 2. 99 

xvi. 15 195 

xvii. 5. 157, 158 

xviii. 14 126 



INDEX OF HEBREW WORDS 



AND PHRASES EXPLAINED. 





Page 


.« 




rait . 


. . 453 


DmziN . 


. . 20 


DIN . 


... 566 




Z 




. . 158 


DIN . 


. . 4? 


DWX . 


. . 535 




546, 547 


o^bn b^x 


168,169 




206,207 




154,155 




. . 418 


pN . 


. . 2 




. . 568 


bm . 


. . 392 


n 






. . 558 




. . 147 


xixi . 


. . 89 




, . ODo 




. . 459 




077 




nx-iDn . 


. . 345 




. . 89 


m>p/ 


rwfc-p-i 


. . 461 


niKD tzw-p/ 




. . 496 


ra . 


. . 426 


Vip-nn . 


258—260 








. . 262 





Page 




. . 6 


brp 


. . 8 




. . 310 


ipna 


. . 277 








. . 78 




. . 277 


n 




bun 


. 557 


ate* ^rrn 


. . 170 


*nn 


. 15 


mn 


. 556 




20,21 


nnosn 


. 371 




. 106 



1 

sed disjunctively 30, 33, 34, 54 
few . . 445 



nnr 


. . 353 


nynn ira 


. . 508 


D^pr 


. . 12 


pnt 


. . 153 


n 




jrr 


. . 493 


itnn 


. . 412 


onin 


. . 126 


nrn 


235 


\tn 


' 369, 370 




223, 224 


Srr 


. . 359 



INDEX OF HEBREW WORDS. 



605 





Page 




Page 




264,265 


Dsr> ^ po 


409,410 


nbn . 


101,102 


*npp 


. 277,365 


Wn . 


. . 191 




... 557 


DHNDn . 


296,297 




... 181 




i&& ion 
ioo, lyw 




1 1 ft 117 077 
110, 11/, Z / / 


prr . 


; . . 41 




. . . 118 


DDin . 


470,471 


bpwn 


... 124 




. . 126 




. . . 188 


b 




nnwo ' 


. 418,419 




. . 378 


3 








K3 


... 467 


s 




NM3 


. 234—236 




537,538 


kM 


. . . 192 




. 20,21 


iri3 


... 446 


KB* . 


. . 516 


nw 


. . . 153 




171,172 


-in 


124,285,286 


pt^ . 


. 19,20 


-M3 


. 285,286 




|D3 


. 453,454 






on#3 


. 131,132 


pa . 


129, 130 




. . . 219 




337,338 






. 


. . 192 


D 




f]DD . 


. . 353 


PD 


. . . 177 


DID . 


'480,481 


?)D 


. 465,466 


nna . 


348,349 


nDD 


. . . 266 


nna . 


534,535 


VDD 


. . . 378 




. . 343 




















. . 78,79 


wrv>nrb . 


. . 86 




. . 70—73 




. . 26 


» 

now 


. . . 221 




. . 569 


biwy 


. 518—521 




. . 525 




. . . 125 


nun? . 


. . 33 


V3D-^/ 


. . . 525 






Tin 


Am 






my ^ J 




. . 277 




. 454,489 




. . 439 






mjno . 


. . 364 


npn-my / 


nDiN rnD . 


39,40 






nipbrra . 


. . 181 


D 




ppno . 


. . 52 


inno *>d 


. 122,151 




. 49,50 




. . . 121 




. . 274 


3?D 


. . . 557 



INDEX OF HEBREW WORDS. 



Page 





. . 152 


HDD-) 


452, 453 




Dv^HD . 


. • 301 


D s p"")D . 


. . 191 


niriD . 


. . 370 


b^DD . 


. . 310 


g 






. . 157 




. . 310 


bvbv . 


192,193 


HD¥ . 


524,525 




. . 263 


~l2f . 


. . 137 



ttHp 

bnp 
PP 

w 

D^p 

PP 

-I 

m 

PI 



432 
97 
8 

556 
, 341 
43,44 
, 298 
, 128 



234—236 
283,284 
. . 298 



Page 

, . 52 
209, note 



bxw 
□mow 12 J 



n 

nin 

mtwi nDipn 
nonn 



338 
51,52 
411 
460 
155 
,196,270 
52,53 
. 369 
. 405 
196,197 
. 188 
537,538 



147, 



148 

556 



189 
340 
150 
158 
491 
33 
198 
308 
509 
198 
147 



INDEX OF GREEK WORDS 

AND PHRASES EXPLAINED. 



ayaSog • 
ayairaiq . 
afxapria . 
ava^x]fiara . 
ava^efiaritiu) 

CLTTOK.piVOfia.1 
CLKOGTo\oL 

aprov eaSiuxTiv 
apxiavvaywyog 
ap-^ireXtwai 
aarstog rw Oew 



B 



fiefiaiOTepov 



Page 

. . 297 
420—422 
. 224 
. 323 
. 79 
. 78 
. 265 
. 433 
. 79 
. 369 
64,65 
. 80 



259, 260 
385, 386 
. . 78 



ya%0(j>v\a.iciov . . . .361 

yiyag 6 

. 443, note 
ypaiinaruq tov 2 69 270 

povQTU)v QapiGaiwv S ' 



$H7TVOV JEVOjUltVOV 
Si £<T07TTpOV 

$i$pa)(juLa 



tyicaivia . 
£ig, juia, ev 



. 458 
. 345 
57, 58 



548 
78 



Page 

EIQ XL 81 

^" we 1 • • • 74, 75 

EAAr]vi<rTai J 

evy .... 351, 352 

oatyvog rov A^paa/Li f 
E^ofioXoysiv .... 78 

E7Tl(j)(i)(TKOV(TY} . . . .401 

£CnC7)VtiK7£V £V T{fJlLV . . 498 

tTEpOV GUffia . . 304, 305 

£(f)Y1IHtpia . . . 181, 182 

Z 

Zv\o<j>opia 549 



SsoKparta 13 

SepcnrevTai 321 

Swiag 323 

I 

i$£iv Savarov .... 79 

i\a(TTi)piov 347 

Iwvia . . . . . . 557 

K 

Ka^aptafiog 425 

Ka^i]y^ri]Q 283 

Kara Kaipov 386 

KCITOIKOVVTEQ 1 
KG.T01KY)(TIQ J 

Ko\vp.firiSpa . . . .385 
icpa<nre$a . . '. 309, 310 



608 



INDEX OF GREEK WORDS. 



Page 

A 

Xa/jnrpog 126 

XlfitpTlVOg . . . 367 

M 

/uerpriTai ..... 425 

^"r^rn . . .469 ! 

fjii)Tz papcov J 

I 

VX)GTUa .... 510, 511 

vofiiKot .... 268,269 
vQnol&aoKakoi . 268, 269 ; 
vv)fir}fizpov .... 403 

O 

oiKOv/iievri 62 

oXoKavrrra 221 

n 

7ra<J X a .... 452, 453 ! 
7T£vrr)KOfTr>7 .... 488 i 

TTEpav 78 | 

TlrjXovaia 558 ! 

7rpaKTopsQ 24 

irpaaiai irpacnai . . . 80 i 

7Tpoj5aTlKY} 385 

7rpo\a/.i(5avu .... 420 

7TpO(7£\vTOl 89 I 

TTpOGICVVElO . . . . . 81 j 

Trpoasv^ . . . 379, 380 

7rpo<j(jt)—oXr]ipia . . . 376 

TTpWTT} flfXEpa TWV d^V^tM 478 
P 

pmxa 78 





Pag« 


s 




<ra/3/3arov 


. . 428 


aaBBarov 


428, 429 


P07rpu)T0v J 


(ra/3/3arov (ra/3j3ara>v 


. 516 


cra($l3a.Tii) (sv) . 


. . 531 




. . 79 


(TVV)(p(i)VTai 


. . 319 


(7v/j.7r\ripov(T$a 


. . 484 




. , 376 


<t\o\ii .... 


378, 379 




. . 359 





. . 39 




. , 39 




. 63,64 




. 63, 64 


rpetg r}/iEpag Km \ 


. . 530 


rpsig vvtcrag f 






. . 378 



V7n)p£T1]Q 

inroraaaeTai 



. 370 
. 256 



(jispofitvoi 255 

(popog 63 

<j)v\a.KTiipia .... 308 



yapiTOti) . 
yzipo^taia 
yziporovia 



79 
200 
200 



. 361 



INDEX, 



A. 

Aaron, the Mgh-priestkood allotted to him and his family, 131, 132; the 
manner in which it was limited to them, 134. 

Abarbanel, his opinion about the antiquity of the Hebrew language, 554. 
Abel, what his sacrifice consisted of, 101. 

Abraham, the Chaldee language was that of his country ; he afterward 
learnt the Hebrew by dwelling among the Canaanites, 563. 

Absalom, whether he was a Nazarite or not, 286 ; the prodigious weight 
of his hair considered, 287. 

Adam, the father of all mankind ; special honours paid to him, 1 . 

Ahasuerus, king of Persia, the Jews dispersed in his reign ; a question 
among the learned who this king Ahasuerus was ; his kindness to the Jews 
owing to queen Esther, 546 ; this name a common appellation of the kings 
of Persia, ibid. 

Ahaz, the shadow goes back ten degrees on his sun-dial, 404 ; questioned 
whether the miracle was wrought on the sun itself, or only on the dial, 404, 
405. 

Alexander the Great enters Jerusalem in a friendly manner, 47 ; be- 
comes kindly disposed toward the Jews, 531. 

Alexander Janngus advises his wife on his death-bed to seek the favour of 
the Pharisees, 302 ; her great success in so doing, 303. 

Angels, the law revealed by their ministry, 262. 

Animal food, arguments to prove it was not vised before the deluge, 101 ; 
arguments on the contrary side, ibid. 

Anointing, whether all the kings of the Hebrews were anointed, 119; the 
manner of anointing, 122; the custom of anointing very ancient, 123; the 
Jewish priests anointed to their office, 139. 

Antediluvians, whether they used animal food, 100 — 103; the absurdity 
of those writers who would compute their ages, not by solar years, but by 
months, 413. 

Antiochus Epiphanes, his impious behaviour at Jerusalem, 48; his decree 
against the Jew^s, 49 ; plundered and profaned the temple, 356 ; forbad the 
reading of the law in the synagogues, 371. 

Aristoaxicy, the supreme government in the nobles, 23, note ; that govern- 
ment subsists in Venice and Holland, ibid. 

Ark of the testimony, its description and use, 346 ; the two tables of the 
law writ by God, and deposited in it, 347; also the pot of manna and 
Aaron's rod, 351. 

Asaph and others, masters of music in David's time, 189. 

Axsideans, their character, 296 ; not a distinct sect from the pious Jews, 
ibid. 

2 R 



610 



INDEX. 



Assyrian captivity of the ten tribes began by Tiglath-pileser, 42 ; com- 
pleted by Salmanassar, ibid. 

Attica, that country divided into ten tribes, 181 ; how the senate was 
chosen, ibid. 

Augustus, reduced Judea into the form of a Roman province, 60 ; a dif- 
ficulty in his time about taxing considered, 61. 

" Awake thou that sleepest," what critics say of that passage, 506. 

B. 

Babel, the confusion of languages there, 559 ; several opinions about the 
manner of this confusion, ibid.; it appears to be the immediate hand of God, 
561 ; how many languages arose from this confusion, 562. 

Babylonish captivity of the tribe of Judah, began in Jehoiakim's reign, 
43 ; afterward the king, nobles, and ten thousand carried captive, ibid. 

Bacchanalia, the heathens supposed to have borrowed their festivity from 
the feast of tabernacles, 493 ; a wild scene of mirth acted in the court of 
the temple, 495. 

Barefoot, to be so in public worship a sign of reverence, 165. 

Bath-kol, what the Jewish rabbies mean by these words, 258 ; a sort of 
divination among the Jews, 259. 

Bells, on the high-priest's garment, their size and number, 151. 

Bethesda, that pool near the temple, famous for its miraculous cures, 
385 ; the etymology of the word, ibid. ; the great virtue of these waters, 
386 ; its healing virtue miraculous, 388 ; when it had this virtue, ibid. ; a 
type of the fulfilment of Zechariah's prophecy, ibid. 

Bible, Jewish, written in the Hebrew language, 565 ; in what character, 
whether Hebrew or Samaritan, 566 ; whether with points or without points, 
572 — 592 ; the general divisions of the Bible, 592 ; how the learned ac- 
count for a supposed false citation, 594 ; the most considerable editions of 
the Hebrew Bible, 595. 

Biblia Complutensia, an edition of the Hebrew Bible, printed at Com- 
plutum in Spain, 595. 

Biblia Regia, an edition printed at Antwerp, so called from Philip II. of 
Spain, 596. 

Biblia Parisiensia, an edition printed at Paris, 596. 

Biblia Anglicana, the Polyglot, printed at London, 596 ; makes eight vo- 
lumes with Castell's Lexicon, ibid. 

Bishops and archbishops, hint of appointing them supposed to be taken 
from the Jewish priests, 180. 

Blackwall, his observations on the style of the New Testament, 82. 

Breeches, those worn by the high-priest described, 145, 146. 

Burnt-offerings, accounted the most excellent sacrifices, 222 ; entirely 
consumed by fire, ibid. ; their grand use to direct to Christ, the true atoning 
sacrifice, 223. 

Buxtorf, his arguments for the antiquity of the Hebrew points, 575, 576 ; 
his answers to Capel's arguments against the antiquity of the points, 584 — 
591. 

C. 

Cabalists, a sort of mystical doctors, 276 ; pretended to discover a mys- 
tery in the sacred text, 277 ; and a sense never intended by the authors, 
ibid. 

Cain, banished for the murder of his brother Abel, 2 ; why punished 
with banishment and not with death, 3 ; various opinions about Cain's 
mark, ibid. 

Caleb and Joshua only bring a good report of Canaan, 21. 



INDEX. 



611 



Canaan, a curse denounced on him by Noah, 6 : why the curse was on 
Canaan and not on Ham, 8 ; what meant by his being " a servant of ser- 
vants," 9. 

Canaan, those who brought a bad" report of it died by the plague, 22. 

Commutes, the Hebrew was their language, 563, 564 ; the names of their 
cities probably of that language, ibid. 

Capel, his arguments against the antiquity of the Hebrew points, 577." 

Captivity of the Hebrew nation, 42 ; the Assyrian captivity that of the 
ten tribes, ibid. ; the Babylonish captivity was that of Judah and Benjamin 
only, 43 ; their several periods, ibid. 

Cherethites and Pelethites, what they were, 127. 

Cherubim, their form and size in the ark, 348 — 350. 

Chinese claim the honour of the original language, 555. 

Christ, the great Messiah, typified by the paschal lamb, 472; in what 
respects a lamb typifies our Lord, 473 ; "the sufferings and death of Christ 
typified by the paschal lamb, 474; the consequences of Christ's death also 
typified, ibid. ; the ways and means of having an interest in Christ, repre- 
sented by lively emblems in the passover, 475. 

Christ called a Nazarene or Nazarite, 291 — 293. 

Christ's "nativity," the day not fixed upon till the fourth century, 498; 
what ground for fixing it to the end of December, 499 ; arguments against 
its being in winter, ibid. ; not improbable that it was at the feast of taber- 
nacles, 500. 

Cities " of refuge," appointed for those guilty of involuntary homicide, 
201 ; the Latin and Hebrew etymology considered, 397 ; the sacred groves 
ancient places of refuge, ibid. ; Mr. Jones's opinion upon that matter, ibid. ; 
six cities of the Levites appointed for cities of refuge, ibid. ; not sanctuaries 
for wilful murderers or atrocious crimes, ibid.; at every cross leading to these 
cities was an inscription, 398. 

Consecration, the Jewish priests consecrated to their office, 138. 

Cornelius, the centurion, not a Jewish proselyte, 107. 

Coronation, the second ceremony at the inauguration of the kings of 
Israel, 123. 

Crown of gold, worn by the high-priest, described, 156, 157. 

Cymbal, what kind of instrument it was, 192. 

Cyrus, king of Persia, restores the Jews to their own land, 44. 

D. 

Dan, a tribe given to idolatry, 136. 

Daniel not admitted among the prophets by the Talmudists, 239; his 
clear prophecy of the Messiah's coming the cause of it, 240. 

David, what was bis sin in numbering the people, 57. 

Days, how the Hebrews distinguished them, 401 ; at what time their 
days begun, ibid. ; their sacred days from even to even, ibid. ; a passage out 
of the evangelist Matthew considered, ibid. ; the beginning of the natural 
day supposed to be by some in the evening, 402 ; by others from the first 
production of light, 403 ; the day divided into hours, 404 ; and into twelve 
parts, ibid. 

Dedication, the feast of, by whom instituted, 548 ; mentioned by Josephus 
as a feast much regarded, ibid. ; the circumstance of Christ's walking in the 
temple at this feast considered, 549. 

Dissenters, inferences by Dr. Prideaux proposed to their consideration, 
372 ; these examined, 373 — 375. 

Divination, adopted from the Heathens, 260 ; the manner in which the 
Christians used it, 261. 

Dreams and visions, the manner of revelation to the prophets, 244. - 



612 



I N L) E \ . 



E. 

Ears, " mine ears hast thou opened," these words considered, 534 . 

East, the heathen idolaters worshipped towards the East, 33.5. 

Eber, his character, 68; the Hebrews take their name from him, ibui. 

Elders of Israel in Egypt, 12 ; and also in Canaan, 23 ; seventy, whether 
a perpetual or temporary institution, 25. 

Elea.zar, why his famdy was deprived of the priesthood, 136. 

Elisha, the story of his passion considered, 243. 

ELlenes and El/enistai, these words considered, 7.5. 

Ephod, a garment worn by the high-priest, 154; a description of it, 155. 

Essenes, ascribe all things to fate and the stars, 304 ; no notice taken of 
them in Scripture, 320; a sect among the Jews, ibid.; the Jewish writers 
speak of them, ibid. ; the etymology of the name, ibid. ; their austere way of 
life, 321, 322; their great veneration for the books of Moses, 323. 

Ethiopians, a tradition among tfiem about the queen of Sheba, 109; and 
about the eunuch baptized by Philip, ibid. 

Evangelists and apostles, their writings criticised upon as to style, 82 — 86. 

Eunuch of Ethiopia, not a proselyte of the gate, 108; from whence he 
came, 109. 

Excommunicated persons not excluded from the temple, 390; the modern 
excommunication of Popery censured, ibid. 

Expiation, the day of, an annual fast, 510; the day of atonement, ex- 
piatory sacrifices being offered thereon, 515; reasons assigned by the Jews 
for fixing this feast to the tenth of the month Tizri, ibid. ; this day to be kept 
with the religious regard of a sabbath, 517; the victims offered were fifteen 
in number, ibid.; the two goats, one of them to be sacrificed, ibid.; the 
rites on this day performed by the high-priest, 521 ; the grand peculiarity of 
this day, the priest entering into the holy of holies, 522; whether he en- 
tered in only once, ibid.; the service performed by him in the sanctuary, 
523 ; the blood ordered to be sprinkled eastward, 524; the spiritual mean- 
ing of the rites used on this day, 525 ; the expiatory sacrifices typical of the 
true expiation made by Christ, 525, 526. 

Ezra restores the worship of God after the captjvity, 46 ; some are of 
opinion that the Hebrew points were added by him, 572. 

F. 

Fast, mentioned in St. Paul's voyage, what fast is there referred to, 
510—512. 

Fasting, instances of this religious practice, 513, 514. 

Fasts and Festivals, the Jewish calendar crowded w ith them, 550. 

Feasts, Jewish, an account of them, 418; the ceremonies used at them. 
422 — 426 ; the table gesture used at these feasts, 427. 

Feasts, weekly, monthly, and annual, 448; the three annual were the 
passover, pentecost, and tabernacles, ibid. ; at each of these the males were 
to appear every year at the national altar, ibid. ; the design of this institution, 
ibid.; the reasons as^ia'ned for the women being exempted, 449; two diffi- 
culties attending this law, 4.50 ; the one, how Jerusalem could contain 
them, answered, ibid. ; the other, how their towns and their houses could be 
left unguarded, 451. 

Fringes, used by the Pharisees, their form and use, 309 — 311. 

G. 

Gaulonites, a political faction raised by Judas of Galilee, 327. 

Garments of the Jewish priests, 145 — 162 ; only worn when they 
officiated, 162; they were provided at the expense of the people, 163: 
what became of them when left off, 164; nothing worn on the hands and 



INDEX. 



613 



feet of the priests when in their ministrations, ibid. ; were supposed to have 
a moral and typical signification, 166. 

Genealogies of the Hebrews, 86; were destroyed by Herod, 87; the 
genealogies of Christ, from whence copied, 88; their genealogical tables 
long since lost, 88, 89 ; their being lost an argument that the Messiah is 
come, ibid. 

Gentiles, an account of their outer court, 99. 

Gnazazel, a name given to the scape-goat, 518; critical remarks upon 
that name, 518 — 521. 

Goats, two, received from the congregation, and set before the tabernacle, 
517; one to be sacrificed, and the other to be sent alive into the wilderness, 
ibid. ; both the goats typical of Christ, 521. 

God may be said to be the king of the Jews, as to their. civil government, 
13 ; he gave them laws, ibid.; proclaimed peace and war, 14; divided their 
marches, ibid.; appointed all their officers of state, 15. 

Government, the patriarchal form thereof, 1 ; cannot subsist without an 
executive power, ibid. ; civil government supposed to be in the first ages, 2. 

Gracilis Mosaicus, the import of these words, 256, 257. 

Greeks, in Scripture, include the whole Heathen world, 67 ; an account 
of them, 75. 

Groves and " high places," religious worship forbid there, 391 ; idola- 
trous worship performed there, 392; for what end Abraham planted a 
grove in Beersheba, ibid. ; the origin of planting sacred groves, ibid. ; the 
custom of burying the dead under trees considered, 393 ; groves usually 
planted on the tops of hills, 394. 

H. 

Hagar, with Ishmael, flee from Abraham's family, 9. 

Ham, his crime against his father Noah, 7 ; why the curse not denounced 
on Ham, but on Canaan his son, 8. 

Haman, why he cast lots for fixing the day for the massacre of the Jews, 
547 ; the lot over-ruled by the God of Israel for defeating the conspiracy, 
548. 

Hammond, his opinion about the pool of Bethesda rejected, 386, 387. 
Hands (holding up), at elections, a custom derived from the Athenians, 
200. 

Hart, Vander, his opinion about Ham's crime, 7. 

Hebraisms, many of them in the New Testament, 77 — 82 . 

Hebrew commonwealth, its form patriarchal and special, 1 ; its govern- 
ment considered, 1 1 ; distinguished into four periods, ibid. ; the form of 
their government while in Egypt, ibid.; a theocracy in the times of Moses 
and Joshua, 1 3 ; its form aristocratical after them, 23; kingly government 
set up among them, 111 ; said to be desired on account of the corruption in 
their courts by Samuel's sons, 112. 

Hebrew language, the Jews confident it was the original language, 553; 
the opinion of others about its antiquity, 554, 555 ; how the original lan- 
guage was formed, 556 ; the names of most ancient persons derived from the 
Hebrew, ibid.; some writers allow not this argument to be conclusive, 
557 ; to what people the Hebrew language belonged after the dispersion at 
Babel, 563; the Hebrew the language of the Canaanites, ibid.; the excel- 
lencies this language is said to have, 565. 

Hebrew character, in what letters the sacred books were written, 566 ; 
whether in the Hebrew character, or in the old Samaritan, ibid. ; the opinion 
of Scaliger and others about this question, ibid.; the arguments on both 
sides, 568 — 571. 

Hebrew points or vowels, 572 ; a great controversy whether they are of 

2 s 



614 



INDEX . 



the same antiquity and authority with the consonants, ibid. ; the several hy- 
potheses on this subject, 572 — 574; the arguments on both sides considered, 
574, &cc. ; arguments for the antiquity of the points, 574 — 576 ; three sorts 
of arguments against the antiquity of the points, 576 — 592. 

Hebrews, the meaning of that word, 68; from whence derived, ibid. ; 
" Hebrew of the Hebrews," a name of honour, 73; their genealogies, 86. 

Hellenists, who were Hellenistic Jews, 74, 75. 

Herod, the temple rebuilt by him, 357 ; a more magnificent structure 
than Zerubbabel's, ibid. ; writers differ in the accounts of it, ibid. ; the time 
when built, 361 ; utterly destroyed by the Romans, 362. 

Herodians, not mentioned by the Jewish historians, 327; mentioned in 
three passages of the New Testament, ibid. ; whether a political party or a 
religious sect; these two opinions considered, 328 — 330. 

High places, a blemish on some pious kings for not destroying them, 396. 

High-priest, a type of Christ, 143; his unction typical of the extraor- 
dinary gifts and influences of the Spirit, ibid.; by some peculiarities different 
from the priests, 170; must marry none but a virgin, ibid.; must not mourn 
for the death of his kindred, 171; forbid to uncover his head, ibid.; must 
not rend his clothes in mourning for the dead, 173; presided over the in- 
ferior priests, 176 ; his peculiar province, 177; his deputy or sagan, ibid. ; 
rites chiefly performed by him on the day of expiation, 521 ; entered that 
day into the holy of holies, 522; ordered to sprinkle the blood eastward, 
524 ; a type of Christ, ibid . ; the expiatory sacrifices offered by him typical 
of the true expiation Christ made, 525, 526. 

Holy of holies, beyond the second veil of the tabernacle, 346. 

Hosea, whether that prophet's taking a wife of whoredom was a real fact 
or a symbolical vision, 251, 252. 

Hours, the day divided into hours, 404 ; an hour the twelfth part of an 
artificial day, ibid. ; various opinions about the greater and lesser hours, 406 ; 
a difficulty about the hour of Christ's crucifixion considered, 406, 407 ; what 
were the hours of prayer observed by the Jews, 408. 

I. 

Jacob's prophecy about the sceptre's departing from Judah considered, 51 ; 
the literal meaning of the words, 51 — 53; the import of the prophecy, 
53, 54. 

Idolatry, the reasons of its being performed in groves, 392 ; this practice 
began with the worship of demons and departed souls, 393. 

JephthaKs vow, 31 ; a great controversy whether he sacrificed his daughter, 
ibid. ; what alleged for her being devoted to perpetual virginity, 32 — 39 ; 
arguments alleged for Jephthah's sacrificing his daughter, 39 — 41. 

Jeroboam's filling the hand of the priests explained, 1 70 ; his idolatry in 
setting up the two golden calves, 349, 350. 

Jerusalem besieged, and the king, nobles, and thousands of people carried 
captive, 43 ; sacked and burnt by the Babylonian general, 44 ; its inhabit- 
ants massacred by Antiochus Epiphanes, 48. 

Jerusalem, its nine gates, 384; the sheep-gate, its situation, 384, 385; 
the pool of Bethesda, its cures miraculous, 385 — 389; its two principal 
gates built by Solomon, 389. 

Jeshurun, why Moses and Israel were called by that name, 19, 20. 

Jethro, his advice to Moses about judging the people, 16; whether an 
ecclesiastical or civil person, 129. 

Jews, settled in their own land after the captivity, 44, 45 ; under the 
authority of the king of Persia, ibid. ; though tributary, enjoyed their own 
religion, and were governed by their own laws, 47 ; favoured by Alexander 
the Great, 48; persecuted by Antiochus Epiphanes, 48, 49; destroy the 



INDEX. 



615 



Heathen altars, 49 ; enjoy their liberty for a long time, 50 ; conquered by 
the Romans, ibid. 

Jews and Gentiles, the meaning of that expression, 67. 

Imposition of hands, used at consecration into an office, 199, 200. 

Inauguration of the kings of the Hebrews, 119 — 127; the anointing and 
other ceremonies attending it, ibid. 

Inspiration, a way of revelation to the prophets, 253; was calm and 
gentle, 254. 

John the Baptist and Zacharias to be reckoned among the prophets, 
241. 

Jonadab the son of Rechab, zealous against idolatry, 294, 295 : what 
rules of living he gave to the Rechabites, his children, ibid. 

Joseph, whether a Nazarite by being separated from his brethren, 285. 

Josephus, his opinion about Cyrus's restoring Israel, 4o ■ prefers Daniel 
to the rest of the prophets, 240 ; his bad character of the Sadducees, 315; 
his account of the largeness of the stones of the temple not probable, 358. 

Joshua, by divine appointment Moses's successor, 15, 20, 22; what his 
name signifies, 20, 21 ; conducts Israel into Canaan, ibid. ; not equal in 
honour to Moses, 22. 

Isaiah, whether the account of his walking naked was a real fact, or a 
symbolical dream, 249. 

Israelites, the Lord their King and their God, 13, 16; two sorts, He- 
brews and Israelites, 73; whence they had riches to build the tabernacle, 
337. 

Jubilee, the grand sabbatical year, 537 ; celebrated every forty-ninth or 
fiftieth year, ibid. ; the etymology of the word, ibid. ; the learned not agreed 
whether kept the forty-ninth or fiftieth year, 538 — 540; proclaimed through 
the whole land, 540; a year of general release of slaves and prisoners, 
541 ; in which all estates returned to their former proprietors, ibid. ; some 
of the Heathens copied after it, ibid. ; its design political in several respect*, 
ibid.; typical of spiritual liberty from the bondage of sin and Satan, 542. 

Judah, his patriarchal authority considered, 10, 11. 

Judas Maccabeus, the motto on his standard, 49; purified the temple 
from the pollution of Antiochus Epiphanes, 356. 
Judas of Galilee, raises a political faction, 327. 

Judges, the form of government under them, 23; appointed on particular 
occasions, 28 — 30; fifteen in number from Othniel to Samuel, 31. 

K. 

Karraites, their opinions, 298; wherein they differed from other Jews, 
299, 300. 

Katholikin, Immarkalin, and Gizbarin, these three sorts of officers superior 
to common priests, 180. 

King, a king granted to the Israelites under several limitations, 113; the 
choice to be reserved to God himself, ibid.; is to be a native Israelite, 114 ; 
was not to multiply horses, ibid. ; was commanded not to multiply wives. 
ibid. ; forbid to multiply silver and gold, 115; enjoined to write a copy of 
the law, 116; was bound to govern by law, 117; and with lenity and kind- 
ness, 119; invested with the kingly dignity by anointing, 119 ; the state and 
magnificence of the Jewish kings, 127, 128. 

Knave, the derivation and meaning of this word formerly, 72. 

Kohathites, Gershonites, and Merarites, what particulars of the tabernacle 
were committed to the care of each of them, 185, 186. 

L. 

Language, what was the original, and how formed, 553, 554; the 



GIG 



INDEX. 



Jews affirm the Hebrew to be the first language, 553; other nation* put 
in their claims, 555 ; the eastern writers give the preference to the Synac, 
556 ; the confusion of languages at Babel, 559—561 ; the excellency of the 
Hebrew language, 565. 

Laws, how enacted and published among the Israelites, 14; the laws and 
limitations concerning their kings, 113. 

Le Clerc, his opinion about Cain's mark, 4 ; what he says about the 
original language is near the truth, 558. 

Leprosy, a very bad disease in Syria, 107. 

Levites, a lower order of the priests, 184; the honour of attending divine 
service assigned to them instead of the first-born, 185; distinguished into 
three classes, ibid. ; afterward divided into twenty-four courses, ibid. ; at 
what age they were to eater on their office, 186; how they were instructed 
ibid.; the different services of the several classes of the priests, 107; vocal 
and instrumental music performed by them, 1 90 ; magistrates of different 
ranks chiefly chosen out of the tribe of Levi, 197 ; the prophetic curse turned 
into a blessing, 197, 201 ; at what age the Levites were consecrated, ibid.; 
the ceremonies used at their consecration, 198 — 200; the places of their 
residence, and their subsistence, 200 — 206 ; the number of cities allotted for 
them, ibid. 

Libertus and Libertinus, the meaning of that distinction, 366. 
Love-feasts, derived from the Jewish feasts upon sacrifices, 419; the time 
when they were kept, 420, 421; the ceremony of washing the feet of the 

guests, 424. 

M. 

Maccabees change the government of the Jews, 49. 

Maimonides, his opinion about the sin of the Israelites in asking a king, 
112. 

Malachi, commonly reckoned the last prophet, 240; how long he pro- 
phesied before Christ's coming, ibid. 

Mark set upon Cain by God, conjectures about it, 3. 

Masora, called by the Jews the hedge and fence of the law, 275. 

Masorites, a lower sort of scribes, 273 ; what was their office, ibid. ; 
doubtful when they first arose, 274 ; their work regarded the letter of the 
Hebrew text, 275; they numbered the verses, words, and letters of the text, 
ibid. ; and marked the irregularities of the text, 276 ; were the authors of 
the marginal corrections, ibid. 

Mattathias destroys the Heathen altars and idolaters, 49. 

Maundrel, his surprising account of the size of some stones, 358, note. 

Meals, Jewish, not many, nor costly, 418. 

Meat-offerings and drink-offerings, of what they consisted, 232; how 
they were offered and consumed, 233. 

Mede, Mr. Joseph, makes the synagogues and proseuchae to be different 
places, 381. 

Melchizedek, a priest as well as a king, 131. 

Mercy-seat and cherubim, 347. 

Metempsychosis, an account of that opinion, 305. 

Mishna, traditionary precepts in that book, 303, 304 ; eighteen collects 
particularly mentioned, 371. 

Monarchy, the supreme authority lodged in a single person, 23, note. 

Months, with the Hebrews, take their name from the moon, 412; when 
this regulation took place, ibid. ; in Noah's time the year consisted of twelve 
months, ibid. ; the absurdity of some who would compute the age of the 
antediluvians, not by solar years, but by months, 413 ; months were counted 
with names by the Jews before the captivity, ibid.; when the new moon was 



!N DEX. 



617 



seen, their month began, 416 ; cycles used for fixing their months and years, 
ibid. 

Mordecai, why he refused to pay respect to Haman, 547 ; some think 
because he was an Amalekite, ibid. ; probably a kind of divine honour was 
ordered to be paid, ibid. 

Moses, the sole judge and viceroy of the Israelites, 12. 19; called king 
of Jeshurun, 19; a famous prophecy about the great Messiah resembling 
Moses, 22; his descendants only common Levites, 184; an evidence he 
was not the author of the laws given to Israel, ibid.; why he may be called 
the greatest prophet, 257. 

Mourning, signs thereof among the Jews and other nations, 172 — 176. 

Music, first introduced into the Jewish service by Moses, 1 88 ; improved 
by David, ibid.; restored by Hezekiah, ibid. ; whether music is to be used 
in Christian worship, 189 ; that used in the temple was both vocal and in- 
strumental, ibid. ; the musical instruments used in the sacred service, 190 — 
193; instrumental music in Christian worship not approved by the ancient 
fathers, 193; at what time it was introduced, 194; where used at present, 
ibid.; disapproved by Luther and the synod of Middleburgh, ibid.; the 
Church of England remonstrates against such music, ibid. 

Music, of use to compose the mind, and free people from melancholy, 
244. 

N. 

Naaman, the Syrian, a Gentile idolater, 104; cured of his leprosy by the 
direction of Elisha, ibid. ; renounced his idolatry, ibid. ; remarks on his 
bowing before Rimmon, 105; supposed to' have erected an hospital for 
lepers, 107; the only miraculous cure of leprosy recorded before the com- 
ing of Christ, ibid. 

Nadab and Abihu struck dead, 134; what was their crime, ibid. 

Nazarene, that text, of Christ's being called one, explained, 291 — 293. 

Nazarites, from whence the name is derived, 285 ; of two sorts, for life, 
or for a limited time, 286; what they were required to do, 286. 288; wo- 
men as well as men might bind themselves by this vow, 289; the institution 
partly religious, partly civil, 290; a Nazarite was a type of Christ, 292. 

Nethinim, why so called, and their office, 207. 

New Testament, various opinions about the dialect thereof, 76 ; instances 
of Latin phrases in it, 77. 

Night, divided by the Hebrews into four watches, 403, 
Nimrod, an oppressive tyrant, 6. 

Noah, pronounced a curse upon Canaan, 6; his honour and authority, 7; 
endued with a prophetic spirit, ibid.; seven precepts given him, 100. 

O. 

Offerings, sin-offering, burnt-offering, peace-offering, 168. 

Officers of the children of Israel in Egypt, for what end, 12. 

Oil, with which the high-priest was anointed, 141 ; of what compounded, 
and how made, ibid. 

Ointment on Aaron's head to his garment, explained, 151. 

Old Testament, in what language written, 566 ; chiefly in Hebrew, ibid. ; 
a small part in Chaldee, ibid. 

Oracles, given to the Jews by an audible voice, 13. 

P. 

Passaver, the original of that word, 452 ; the time and month when this 
feast was kept, 453; the two names of the month wherein kept, ibid.; 
the distinction between the passover and the feast of unleavened bread, 

2 T 



618 



INDEX. 



455 ; the opinion of the critics about the time our Saviour kept the pass- 
over, 455 — 457 ; reasons to show that Christ kept it at the usual time, ibid. ; 
some passages of Scripture relating to the time of keeping the passover, ex- 
plained, 458, 459 ; the matter of the paschal feast, a lamb without blemish, 
460 — 462; a male of the first year, ibid.; and taken from the flock four 
days before it was killed, 463; the place where it was to be killed, 464; 
the sprinkling of the blood on the side-posts and doors of the houses, 465; 
it was to be roasted, 467 ; to be eaten standing in the posture of travellers, 
with loins girt and shoes on their feet, and staves in their hands, 468, 469; 
to be eaten with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, 469, 470 ; nothing was 
to remain till the morning, 471; they were to keep in their own houses all 
night, 472 ; the passover had a typical reference to Christ in various par- 
ticulars, 472. 477. 

Patriarchal form of government, 1 ; an instance of it in Adam, ibid. ; its 
continuance among thelsraelites, 2; instances of it, 6. 9, 10. 

Paul, the apostle, his offering a sacrifice how accounted for, 17; his not 
knowing the high-priest accounted for, 163. 

Peace-offerings, the intention of these sacrifices, 228 ; in what manner 
offered, 229. 

Pentecost, feast of, the second great festival of the Jews, 483; called 
the "feast of weeks," ibid.; how the rabbies computed the seven weeks, 
484; on what day of the week this feast fell, when the Holy Ghost was 
sent down on the apostles, 484, 485 ; by the computation of the Scribes 
it was on the first day of the week, 486 ; was called the " feast of harvest," 
and why, ibid. ; and also the "day of the first-fruits," 487; why leavened 
bread was used at pentecost, when forbid at the passover, ibid. ; this feast 
called the " fiftieth," and why, 488; and also the day of the giving of the 
law, ibid. ; the rabbies call it " gnatsereth," and why, 489. 

Pharisees, from whence so named, 301 ; uncertain when this sect sprung up, 
ibid. ; their opinion of holding the tradition of the elders, 308 ; their doctrinal 
and practical points, 304; held the doctrine of the resurrection in a proper 
sense, 306; their various errors proceeded from their regard to traditions, 
ibid.; were busied about trifles, and neglected the weightier matters of the 
law, 307 ; made broad their phylacteries, 308 ; enlarged the borders of 
their garments, 309; their unreasonable opposition to Christ, 312. 

Phylacteries, used by the Pharisees, 308 ; what they were, and for what 
used, ibid.; what meant by making them broad, 309. 

Pope of Rome, the jubilee of the Jews imitated by him, 542. 

Porters, their office about the temple, 194. 

Prayer, a part of the synagogue service, 371 ; what hours of prayer were 
observed by the Jews, 408; what hours observed by the Mahometans, 409. 

Praying or prophesying, by a woman, that passage of Scripture con- 
sidered, 238. 

Preaching to the people, and expounding the Scriptures, one part of the 
synagogue service, 375. 

Prideaux, his opinion about the liturgies and collects of the Jews, 371 ; 
two inferences made by him for the consideration of Dissenters, 372 ; these 
inferences considered, 373 — 375. 

Priest, the ceremony of the high-priest's consecration, 138, 139; clothed 
with pontifical garments, and then anointed, ibid. ; whether there was a 
priest anointed for war, 140; enrobed with eight sacerdotal garments, 144. 

Priests, what sort of officers they were among- the Hebrews, 129; to 
whom it belonged to execute the office of a priest, 1 30 ; this office allotted 
to Aaron and his sons, 132; the difficulty of some persons officiating as 
priests considered, ibid.; what might be the reason of the priesthood being 
transferred from Eleazar's to Ithamar's family, 136, 137; their washing. 



INDEX. 



619 



anointing, and clothing considered, 138 — 149; sacrifices at their consecra- 
tion, 168; some parts of their office, 176, 177; divided into twenty-four 
companies serving by rotation, 181; four of them returned from the cap- 
tivity, 184; how the priests were maintained, 201. 

Priests and Levites, their office and allotments, 16, 17. 

Prophets, three words by which named in Scripture, 234; these names in 
Hebrew particularly considered, 234 — 236; their duty and business, 236; 
in a proper sense, those who had a revelation of secret things from God, 
and declared them to others, ibid.; that title given to others, 237; the re- 
puted number of real prophets and prophetesses from Abraham to Malachi, 
239; the most essential qualification of a prophet was true piety, 242; the 
mind must be in a proper frame for receiving the prophetic spirit, ibid. ; 
visions and dreams one way of divine revelation to them, 244 ; the criteria 
by which they knew their revelations came from God, 245 — 248; whether 
their symbolical actions were real facts or visions, 248 — 253; ecstasies the 
sign of a false prophet, 254; the import of prophets being moved by the 
Holy Ghost, 255 ; and of the spirits of the prophets being subject to the 
prophets, 256; things revealed to the prophets by voices, 257; why their 
writings called " a more sure word of prophecy," 259; their schools, 262; 
who called the " sons of the prophets," 263. 

Proselytes, two sorts of them, 89; the privileges of the "proselytes of 
righteousness," 90 ; the manner of their admission, according to the rabbies, 
90 — 94 ; the " proselytes of the gate," their admission and privileges, 97 — 
99; those proselytes did not exist as the rabbies mention, 110. 

Proseucha, oratories or places of prayer, 379 ; the word proseucha con- 
sidered, ibid. ; a note of Mr. Jones upon that word, 330 ; different from the 
synagogues, according to Mede and Prideaux, 381 ; the proof in favour of 
this notion not very strong, 382. 

Purim, the feast of, 544 ; instituted by Mordecai for the Jews' deliverance 
from Hainan's conspiracy, ibid. ; its bad effects the same as other human 
institutions, ibid. ; when and how kept, 545 ; when and in what king's reign 
this affair happened, 545 — 547. 

Publicans, appointed by the Romans to gather the Jewish taxes, 62 ; 
three sorts of taxes, 63; three sorts of publicans, 63, 64; the reason of the 
general hatred of them, 65. 

Pythagoras, said to have sacrificed an hecatomb, 323. 

Pythagoreans, their swearing by the number four wrote by ten dots, 322. 

Pythagoreans and Platonists, their opinions of the metempsychosis, 305. 

R. 

Rabbi, when that title was first assumed, 279 ; the title conferred with 
great ceremony, 280 ; a question whether our Lord had that title, 281 ; why 
he forbad his disciples to be called by that title, 283 ; what meant by the 
titles of Rab, Rabbi, and Rabban, 283, 284. 

Rabbinists and Karraites differ in several things, 299. 

Ram, offered at the consecration of the priest, 168; the blood put on 
various parts of their bodies, 169; it signified that all must be sanctified 
and accepted by the blood of Christ, 170. 

Reading the Scriptures, a part of the synagogue service, 370. 

Rechabites were Kenites, descended from Jethro, 293 ; their vows of not 
drinking wine or possessing vineyards, 294. 

Righteous and good man, these words explained, 297. 

Romans conquer Judea, and reduce it to a Roman province, 50. 

S. 

Sabbath, to be observed by the proselytes as well as the Jews, 98. 



620 



INDEX. 



Sabbath, the different acceptations of that word, 428, 429; proofs of it* 
institution after the creation, 430 — 432; probable that the Jewish was kept 
the day before the patriarchal sabbath, 433; the institution of the Jewish 
sabbath, 433, 434; marked out by manna not raining on that day, ibid.; 
kept on a different day from the paradisiacal sabbath, ibid. ; a memorial of 
their deliverance out of Egypt, 435 ; a sign between God and Israel, 437 ; 
the law ctf the sabbath enforced by capital punishments, ibid. ; what duties 
belonged to it, 438; what the keeping of it holy imports, 438, 439; what 
blessings the word " remember" hath a respect to, ibid. ; they were to ab- 
stain from all manner of work, 439; were not to do or find their own plea- 
sure, 440 ; self-defence forbid on this day by some, which occasioned a thou- 
sand Jews to be slain, 441; thirty-nine negative precepts about things not 
to be done on this day, ibid. ; what it is to sanctify the sabbath, 442 — 444 ; 
the ends of the institution partly political, partly religious, 444 ; the political, 
that servants and beasts of burden might be refreshed, ibid. ; the religious, 
to commemorate God's work of creation, 445 ; and deliverance from Egyp- 
tian bondage, 446; and to prepare for heavenly blessedness, ibid.; was a 
type of the heavenly rest, 447. 

Sabbatical year, or seventh year's rest, 527 ; distinguished by several names, 
ibid. ; the peculiar observances of that year, ibid. ; from whence the com- 
putation of the year began, 528 ; at what season it began, 529 ; a total ces- 
sation this year from agriculture, 529 — 531 ; the product of the ground to 
be enjoyed in common, 531 ; the remission of debts from one Israelite to 
another, 532; whether the Hebrew servants were released in the sabbatical 
year, 533; the public reading of the law at this time, 535; the reason on 
which the law was founded, partly civil, partly religious, 536 ; this year 
typified the spiritual rest Christ will give to his people, ibid.; 

Sacrifices, a double use of them, 1 7 ; by whom they were offered, 1 30 
— 133; sacrifices at the consecration of the priests, 168. 

Sacrifices, practised in the first ages of the world, 208 ; the opinion of 
some that sacrifices were an human institution, 210; the meaning of 
some passages of Scripture about sacrifices, 210, 211 ; evidences that sacri- 
fices were originally of divine institution, 212 — 214; but afterward greatly 
corrupted, both as to their subjects and objects, 214; they include all the 
offerings made to God, 215; taken in a large and a strict sense, ibid.; were 
strictly either of beasts or birds, ibid.; were an acknowledgment of re- 
ceiving good things from God, ibid. ; were a means of repentance and hu- 
miliation for sin, ibid. ; they typified the promised sacrifice of atonement by 
the Son of God, ibid. ; the victim was substituted in the room of the trans- 
gressor, 216; and God in mercy took the victim as an expiation for the 
offender, 217; what was offered in sacrifice was to be perfect in its kind, 
221; distinguished into four kinds, ibid.; the burnt-offerings were wholly 
consumed, ibid. ; sin-offerings, the law about them laid down in Scripture, 
223; trespass-offerings greatly resembled the sin-offerings, 227; peace-offer- 
ings were one sort of sacrifices, 228; public sacrifices offered morning and 
evening, 231,; a double offering every sabbath-day, ibid. ; extraordinary 
sacrifices offered at the public feasts, ibid.; were also offered for particular 
persons, ibid. ; distinguished likewise into animal and vegetable, 232 ; meat- 
offerings and drink-offerings offered, ibid. ; the Jews rarely refused to offer 
their proper sacrifices, 233; the difficulty reconciled of being offered in other 
places besides the national altar, 395. 

Sadducees differed much from the Pharisees, 384 ; the etymology of their 
name, 314; the most wicked of the Jews, 315; their doctrines, ibid.; deny 
the resurrection, ibid. ; their bad character by Josephus, ibid. ; what sacred 
book they admitted, ibid.; are said to be the richest sect, 317. 

Sagan, the high-priest's deputy, 177; what alleged for their divine insti- 
tution, 180. 



INDEX. 



621 



Sailing, formerly reckoned dangerous after the autumnal equinox, 511. 

Salutations, why Elisha forbid Gehazi to give a salutation, 422 ; why our 
Lord said to his disciples, " salute no man," 423. 

Samaritans, what they were originally, 317; their religion, 318; the mu- 
tual animosity between them and the Jews, 319. 

Sanhedrim, arguments alleged for its antiquity, 25 ; but probably only in 
the time of the Maccabees, 27 ; what methods they used to find the time of 
the new moon, 416. 

Scaliger, his opinion of the sacred books being wrote in the Samaritan cha- 
racter, 566 ; his severe names to writers of a different opinion, ibid. 

Schools of the prophets, 384; and sons of the prophets, 385; schools and 
academies among the Jews, 377 ; the pupils sat at their tutors' feet, ibid. ; 
these schools different from the synagogues, 378. 

Scribes, two sorts of them, 266 ; what the office o£ the civil Scribes, 
266 — 268 ; what of the ecclesiastical Scribes, 268, 269 ; they were the 
preaching clergy among the Jews, 270 ; the difference between their teach- 
ing and that of Christ, 270, 271 ; what meant by the phrase, " Scribes and 
Pharisees," 272 ; were of great power and authority in the state, 273 ; the 
origin of their office, ibid. 

Septuagint, some say that the Hebrew copies these ancient interpreters 
used, had no points, 589. 

Shechinah, or miraculous light, a token of the special presence of God, 351, 

Shiites and Sonnites, sectaries among the Mahometans, 300. 

Shiloh, in Jacob's prophecy, explained, 52. 

Shophetim and Shoterim, the distinction between them, 196. 

Shuckford, his opinion about Cain's mark, 4 ; his hypothesis about the 
confusion of languages, 561. 

Simeon and Levi, a curse denounced on them, 10. 

Simeon, whether good old Simeon was president of the Sanhedrim, 280. 

Sin-offerings, laws and rites about them, 223 ; on what occasions offered, 
224 — 226. 

Solomon, whether guilty of idolatry, 36. 

Sortes Homeric^ and " Sortes Virgilianae," a sort of divination, 260. 
Sortes Sanctorum, formerly used, but afterwards condemned, 261, 262. 
Sprinkling of blood and oil upon the high-priest's garments, explained, 
152, 153. 

Strangers " of the gate" among the Israelites, 97 ; should not blaspheme 
God, and should keep the sabbath, 98 ; thousands of strangers in Solomon's 
time, 99. 

Subdeacons of the Church of Rome, imitating the Nethinim, 208. 

Suburbs of the cities of the Levites, the extent of them, 201 . 

Sun, worship of, supposed to be set up by Cain, 3. 

Sykes, his Essay on Sacrifices considered, 208, note ; makes ail sacrifices 
to be federal rites, 215; his arguments against vicarious expiation confuted, 
217—220. 

Synagogues, used in two senses, 363 ; denoted commonly places of public 
worship, ibid.; a great number of them sdd to be in Jerusalem, ibid.; ques- 
tioned whether there were any before the Babylonish captivity, 364; in what 
manner the people met after their settlement in the land of Canaan, 365 y 
what was the synagogue of the Libertines, 366 — 368 ; queried how Christ 
and his apostles " taught" in the synagogues, 368 ; what meant by " a ruler" 
of the synagogue, 369 ; and by "the officer" who prayed, ibid. ; the worship 
in them was by reading the Scriptures, prayer, and preaching, ibid. ; the 
law divided into fifty-four sections, 370 ; the synagogues used also for holding 
courts of justice, 376 ; that passage of Scripture, of coming into the assembly 
or synagogue in goodly apparel, considered, 376, 377, 



622 



m 



N DEX , 



Tabernacle, the Divine presence manifested there, 13 ; minutely described 
by Moses, 333 ; three tabernacles before Soiomon's temple, 333, 334 ; that 
made by Moses, according to God's command, considered, 334 ; the hea- 
thens had tabernacles, ibid. ; a moveable fabric, 336 ; an expensive build- 
ing, ibid. ; the particular model of the tabernacle, 338 — 340; the covering 
of it, 340; the inside of it, 341 ; the court, 341, 342 ; the altaT of burnt- 
offering, 342 ; the fire to be kept constantly burning, 344 ; the brazen laver, 
ibid.; the altar of incense, 345; the golden candlestick, and table of shew- 
bread, 346 ; the holy of holies and the ark, 346, 347 ; the form of the 
mercy-seat and cherubim, 347 ; the tabernacle and its furniture typical of 
spiritual blessings, 359 

Tabernacles, f&*S of, the third great festival of the Jews, 49o ; why so 
called, ibid- s called also " the feast of in-gathering," ibid. ; that properly 
different from "the feast of tabernacles," 491 ; during this feast they were 
to dwell in tents and booths made of branches of trees, 491 — 494 ; the- 
practice of the Jews as to those branches, ibid. ; the first and last day kept 
as sabbaths, 494 ; an extraordinary ceremony about drawing water out of 
the pool of Siloam, 495 ; various reasons why celebrated at this time of the 
year, 496, 497 ; had a typical reference to the incarnation and birth of our 
Saviour, 498. 

Talmudists, their account of the inscription on the high-priest's breast- 
plate, 160. 

Taxes, Jewish, occasional and stated, 55 — 60 ; various sorts levied by 

the Romans, 60. 

Temple at Jerusalem more magnificent than the tabernacle, 352 ; one 
built by Solomon, and another by Zerubbabel, ibid. ; wherein the glory of 
the latter was greater than the former, 353, 356 ; stood on Mount Zion, 353 ; 
its expense prodigious, 354; built in the same form with the tabernacle, 
ibid. ; the first temple destroyed by the king of Babylon, 355 ; the tune of 
its standing, ibid. ; the second temple built by Zerubbabel, ibid. ; much in- 
ferior to the first, 356 ; the second temple wanted five remarkable things, 
356, 357 ; profaned by Antiochus, and again purified by Judas Maccabaeus, 
357 ; the temple rebuilt by Herod, 358 ; its great circumference, 359 ; the 
first court thereof that of the Gentiles, ibid. ; then the court of the Israelites, 
ibid. ; excommunicated persons not excluded from the temple, 390. 

Temple-music, when first introduced, 188; what instruments used, 190— 
193. 

Therapeuta, who they were, 321. 

Theocracy among the Israelites, 13; instances of God's being their king, 
14; was to be consulted from time to time, 16. 

Tithes, the Levites' subsistence chiefly from them, 202 — 204 ; why they 
were thus supported, 205 ; why that proportion of a tenth, rather than any 
other, was appointed, 206. 

Trespass-offerings resembled sin-offerings, 227 ; their difference, ibid. ; the 
opinions of learned men about this, 227, 228. 

Trumpets, blown when the year of jubilee was proclaimed, 188, 189; 
were sounded by the priests, 190. 

Trumpets and new moons, feast of, kept on the first day of every month, 
50 1 ; the sacrifices prescribed on this occasion, ibid. ; new moons and sab- 
baths, days of public worship, 502 ; the uncertainty of fixing the new moon, 
503 ; the manner wherein it is kept by the modern Jews, 504 ; why sacri- 
fices were offered at this season, 505 ; the sin-offering then offered, and 
remarks upon the design of it, ibid. ; the new moon in the month Tisri 



INDEX. 



623 



observed with solemnity, 506 ; the trumpets blown from morning to even- 
ing, ibid. ; the learned divided about the reason of this festival, ibid. ; the 
design of blowing the trumpets, 507,;, what the sounding, of the trumpet 
is a memorial of, 508 ; what notion the modern Jews have about this day, 
509. 3 
Tyrannus, who he was, and the etymology of the name, 378. 

U. 

Unleavened bread, feast of, followed the passover, and was kept seven 
days, 477 ; the passover distinct from this feast, but the name of either used 
for both, 478 ; during this feast no leavened bread to be eaten, or to be in 
their houses, 479 ; the penalty for eating leavened bread, 480 ; the first and 
last days to be kept holy as sabbaths, 481 ; an offering of a sheaf of the 
first-fruits to be made, ibid. ; the moral and typical signification of this offer- 
ing, 482. 

Urim and Thummim, the signification of these words, 158; various opi- 
nions about them, 159 — 162. 

V. 

Vessels for keeping the oil used for anointing the kings, of two sorts, 121. 
Vestal virgins, some of their customs borrowed from the Jewish Levites, 
187. 

Vestments, sacerdotal, peculiar to the high-priest, 149; provided at the 
expense of the people, 163 ; their moral and typical signification, 166. 

Viri stationarii, what the Jewish doctors say of them, 206. 

Visions, one of the ways of divine revelation to the prophets, 244, 245 ; 
the criteria whereby their revelations were known to come from God, 
245 — 248 ; whether several symbolical actions of the prophets are an his- 
tory of real facts, or only visions, 248 — 253. 

W. 

Washing, Christ washing his disciples' feet an extraordinary case, 424 ; 
designed to instruct them in humility and benevolence, 425. 

Watches, the night divided by the Hebrews into four of them s 403 . 
Waving the sacrifice, of two kinds, 198. 

Weeks, Jewish, of two sorts, 409; the one ordinary, the other extraor- 
dinary, ibid. ; the ordinary made by God himself from the beginning, ibid. ; 
hence the seventh day has been held sacred, ibid. ; a passage in Genesis 
considered in relation to weeks, ibid.; time divided by Noah and Laban 
by sevens, 411 ; the extraordinary or prophetical weeks, ibid.; the amount 
of the prophetical weeks of Daniel, ibid. 

Wise men, to whom this appellation was given, 264 

Woman, what offering to bring after child-bearing, 222. 

Women singers, admitted into the temple choir, 188. 

World, some conclude it will last six thousand years, 536. 

Y. 

Year, Jewish, partly lunar, partly solar, 414 ; the manner of reducing 
their lunar years to the solar, ibid. ; the distinction of the civil and sacred 
year, ibid. ; when each of them began, ibid. ; what computations of time 
they used, 415 — 417; a new beginning of the year appointed by God at the 
Israelites' coming out of Egypt, and why, 417. 



624 



INDEX. 




/ . 



Zadoc and Abiathar, partners in the priesthood in David's reign, 135. 
Zechariah, four fasts mentioned by that prophet, 549 ; these not ap- 
pointed by the law of Moses, ibid. 

Zerubbabel, chosen governor of Judah, 45. 



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